NEW  BROOMS 


.  OF  CALIF.  LIBRABY,  LOS  AflG^LES 


NEW  BROOMS 


By 
ROBERT  J.  SHORES 


INDIANAPOLIS 

THE   BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


COPYRIGHT  1913 
THE  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 


PRESS    OF 

BRAUNWORTH  &  CO. 

BOOKBINDERS    AND    PRINTERS 

BROOKLYN.    N.    V. 


CONTENTS 

PACK 

I  A  PHILOSOPHICAL  COOK 1 

II  A  BACHELOR  ON  WOMEN          .        .         ...       16 

III  ON  PENSIONING  WRITERS       .  .         .        .        .         .20 

IV  A  PURITAN  IN  BOHEMIA  .         .         .         .  27    y 
V  AN  ARRAIGNMENT  OF  ORIGINALITY          .        .  42  * 

VI  A  FLATTERING  TRIBUTE  .         .        .         .         .51 

VII  THE  RIDDLE  OF  A  DREAM 53     / 

VIII  BEDS  FOR  THE  BAD          ......       61 

IX  Is  CHESTERTON  A  MAN  ALIVE  ?  .         .         .69 

X  FROM  A  HUNCHBACK       ......       77 

XI  FROM  A  HOTEL  SPONGE 89 

XII  FROM  SARAH  SHELFWORN 96 

XIII  FROM  ANNA  PEST 104 

XIV  FROM  SETH  SHIRTLESS 110 

XV  SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY        .         .         .         .         .         .118 

XVI    MR.  BODY  PROTESTS 126 

XVII    ON  A  CERTAIN  CONDESCENSION  IN  FASHION  WRITERS  138 

XVIII    OF  LOOKING  BACKWARD 146      , 

XIX   THE  LITERARY  LIFE 165  * 

XX   THE  POETIC  LICENSE 162 

XXI    THE  NECESSITY  FOR  BEGGARS  ....  168 

XXII    THE  ABUSES  OF  ADVERSITY      .....  173 

XXIII  THE  SCIENCE  OF  MAKING  ENEMIES  .         .         .182 

XXIV  THE  FATE  OF  FALSTAFF 192 

XXV   THE  REWARD  OF  MERIT 202 

XXVI    THE  BLESSINGS  OF  THE  BLIND          .         .         .         .212 
XXVII    A  TALE  OF  A  MAD  POET'S  WIFE     .         .         .         .224 

XXVIII   THE  LOCK-STEP 232 

XXIX   THE  FRUIT  OF  FAME  260 


NEW  BROOMS 


NEW  BROOMS 

A  PHILOSOPHICAL  COOK 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  Though  I  am  not  one  of  your 
subscribers  I  am,  I  believe,  one  of  your  most 
faithful  readers.  I  do  not  take  your  magazine, 
it  is  true,  but  I  am  at  present  employed  in  a 
family  some  member  of  which  is  evidently  a 
subscriber,  as  the  maid  brings  it  out  in  the 
waste-paper  basket  regularly,  once  a  month, 
when,  according  to  her  custom,  she  permits  me 
to  select  from  the  month's  periodicals  such 
journals  as  seem  to  me  to  be  worthy  of  my  at- 
tention in  my  leisure  hours.  I  shall  not  conceal 
from  you  the  fact  that  my  fancy  was  first  at- 
tracted to  your  publication  by  the  fact  that  I 
always  found  it  fresh  and  clean,  with  the  leaves 
still  uncut,  and  not  soiled,  bedraggled  and 
often  coverless  as  are  some  of  the  others  which 

I 


2  NEW   BROOMS 

suffer  more  usage  before  reaching  me.  But 
having  once  cut  the  leaves  with  a  convenient 
bread-knife  and  looked  through  one  of  your 
numbers,  I  perceived  at  once  that  you  are,  in 
your  way,  something  of  a  philosopher,  and  I 
have  ever  been  partial  to  everything  that 
smacked  of  philosophy.  Could  you  step  into 
my  pantry  at  the  present  moment  you  would 
find  upon  my  shelves  Plato  and  Aristotle  as 
well  as  the  immortal  Mrs.  Rorer,  for  I  am,  in 
my  humble  fashion,  a  philosopher  as  well  as  a 
cook.  I  do  not  at  all  agree  with  that  learned 
and  talented  French  gentleman  who  declared 
that  to  study  philosophy  was  to  learn  to  die; 
on  the  contrary,  I  hold  that  to  study  philosophy 
is  to  learn  to  live,  and  I  see  no  reason  why  the 
study  of  philosophy  is  not  as  fitting  an  occu- 
pation for  a  cook  as  for  a  collegian.  Therefore 
I  cook  or  philosophize  according  to  my  inclina- 
tion, and  if  it  seem  to  you  that  I  philosophize 
like  a  cook,  my  employer,  I  am  proud  to  say, 
will  tell  you  that  I  cook  like  a  philosopher. 

In  youth  I  had  the  advantage  of  a  grammar 
school  education,  and  that  education  I  have 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK       3 

supplemented  with  reading  and  observation. 
If,  as  Pope  has  said, 

"The  proper  study  of  mankind  is  man," 

then  I  have  entered  the  right  school  for 
the  completion  of  my  education;  for  the 
kitchen  is,  it  seems  to  me,  a  natural  observa- 
tory for  the  study  of  human  nature.  Working 
away  at  my  chosen  profession  in  the  seclusion 
of  my  kitchen,  I  can,  without  ever  having  laid 
eyes  upon  him,  give  you  a  complete  character 
of  the  head  of  the  household.  I  can  not  with 
certainty  say  whether  he  is  a  large  or  small 
man,  because  the  appetite  is  sometimes  decep- 
tive in  this  respect,  and  I  have  known  a  small 
man  to  eat  as  much  as  would  suffice  for  two 
stevedores,  and  I  have  known  an  athlete  to 
peck  at  a  meal  that  would  leave  a  child  hungry. 
It  is  not,  then,  by  his  physical  character  that  I 
judge  him,  but  by  his  mental  and  psycholog- 
ical symptoms.  I  do  not  gage  him  by  how 
much  he  eats,  but  by  what  he  eats.  I  can  not 
tell  you  whether  he  is  large  or  small,  but  I  can 
tell  you  whether  he  is  voluptuous  or  esthetic, 


4  NEW   BROOMS 

good-natured  or  crabbed,  rich  or  poor,  wise  or 
foolish. 

It  is  really  remarkable  the  knowledge  I 
come  to  have  of  this  person  whom  I  have  never 
seen,  or  it  would  be  if  the  method  by  which 
I  reach  my  conclusions  were  not  so  simple.  If 
he  keeps  fast  days  and  eats  only  fish  upon  Fri- 
days, I  know,  of  course,  that  he  is  a  churchman. 
If  he  persistently  eats  food  which  is  bad  for 
any  man's  digestion,  I  know  that  he  is  both 
irritable  and  obstinate,  for  no  man  can  continue 
to  eat  what  does  not  agree  with  him  without 
becoming  irritable,  and  no  man  will  continue 
such  a  course  in  the  face  of  his  better  judgment 
unless  he  is  obstinate.  If  he  eats  only  of  rich 
food  and  shows  a  constant  preference  for  taste 
over  nutrition,  I  know  that  he  is  a  voluptuary ; 
it  is  seldom  that  a  man  indulges  himself  in  a 
passion  for  over-eating  who  does  not  indulge 
himself  in  other  passions  as  well,  and  even 
though  his  one  indulgence  be  eating,  he  is  none 
the  less  a  voluptuary  by  nature.  If  he  eats  lit- 
tle and  that  in  an  abstracted  manner,  some- 
times overlooking  a  favorite  dish  or  allowing 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK       5 

his  soup  to  grow  cold  so  that  it  is  returned 
half-eaten,  I  know  that  he  is  absent-minded 
and  eats  merely  because  he  has  to,  not  because 
he  loves  eating  for  its  own  sake.  If  he  insists 
upon  having  his  toast  an  exact  shade  of  brown 
and  his  coffee  at  a  given  degree  of  tempera- 
ture, I  know  that  he  is  exacting  and  particular 
as  to  details;  that  he  thinks  well  of  himself 
and  thinks  of  himself  often. 

So,  as  you  see,  there  are  hundreds  of  these 
moral  symptoms  which  are  as  familiar  to  me 
as  physical  symptoms  are  to  a  physician.  Thus 
I  supplement  my  theoretical  knowledge  of 
philosophy  by  my  observation  of  life. 

When  I  was  casting  about  me  for  an  occu- 
pation I  had,  being  an  orphan,  a  per- 
fectly free  choice.  Had  I  followed  my  first 
impulse,  I  think  I  should  have  gone  to  live  in 
a  tub  like  Diogenes,  and  have  resolved  to  spend 
my  life,  like  Schopenhauer,  in  thinking  about 
it.  But  a  little  observation  soon  convinced  me 
that  the  man  who  lives  in  the  fashion  of  Diog- 
enes is  not  held  in  high  favor  in  these  days 
and  that  philosophy,  as  a  profession,  would  be 


likely  to  prove  unremunerative.  Now  I  am  not 
one  who  desires  riches  or  who  can  not  be  happy 
without  wealth,  but  I  soon  decided  that  I  must 
be  possessed  of  a  certain  amount  of  money  in 
order  to  indulge  my  taste  for  personal  cleanli- 
ness. I  soon  gave  over  the  tub  of  Diogenes, 
but  I  was  loath  to  forego  all  intercourse  with 
the  ordinary  domestic  tub. 

Having  determined,  therefore,  to  enter  upon 
some  profession  in  which  I  could  make  a  rea- 
sonable amount  of  money  without  requiring  a 
great  preliminary  outlay,  I  looked  about  me 
for  a  vocation  which  might  supply  my  physical 
needs,  and  at  the  same  time,  afford  me  some 
mental  and  spiritual  satisfaction.  I  dismissed 
the  study  of  the  law  or  medicine  as  beyond  my 
means,  and  I  did  not  find  myself  sufficiently 
religious  to  permit  me  to  enter  the  ministry 
with  a  clear  conscience.  For  trade  I  had  your 
true  philosopher's  distaste,  and  I  confess  no 
sort  of  manual  labor,  except  as  cooking  may 
be  so  described,  held  any  attraction  for  me.  I 
shuddered  at  the  thought  of  becoming  a  bar- 
ber, chiropodist  or  hair-dresser,  and  my  pride 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK       7 

would  not  permit  me  to  suffer  the  rebuffs 
which  fall  to  the  lot  of  a  pedler,  book  agent 
or  commercial  traveler. 

It  was  then  that  I  was  struck  with  my  happy 
inspiration.  I  would  become  a  member  of  an 
old  and  honorable  profession — I  would  become 
a  cook.  If  I  could  not  be  a  philosopher  and 
nourish  men's  minds,  I  would  be  a  cook  and 
nourish  their  bodies.  I  would  make  dishes  so 
delicious  and  enticing  that  men  upon  the  brink 
of  suicide  would  turn  back  to  life  with  new 
hope  in  their  hearts.  I  would  impart  energy  to 
the  weary,  peace  to  the  troubled  in  mind  and 
happiness  to  the  discontented.  I  would  become 
such  a  cook  as  might  have  won  the  praise  of 
Lucullus ;  I  would  become  an  artist  worthy  to 
take  the  hand  of  Epicurus.  Such  were  the  ex- 
travagant hopes  I  hugged  to  my  breast  when 
I  matriculated  at  the  best  cooking-school  of 
my  native  state.  It  is  true  that  my  achieve- 
ments have  fallen  far  short  of  my  ambitions, 
but  I  have  never  swerved  from  my  allegiance 
to  my  ideal  of  the  Perfect  Dinner. 

Upon  finishing  my  course  at  cooking-school, 


8  NEW   BROOMS 

I  utilized  my  savings  in  indulging  myself  in 
a  post-graduate  course  abroad.  I  went  to 
Paris,  and  there  I  made  the  acquaintance  of 
the  immortal  Frederick  of  the  Tour  d'Argent, 
he  of  the  famous  pressed  ducks,  and  of  other 
masters  of  the  culinary  art. 

This,  then,  was  my  preparation  for  a  life  of 
cooking.  Possibly  you  will  think  that  I  took 
my  profession  too  seriously;  possibly  you  do 
not  hold  the  same  high  opinion  of  the  art  of 
cooking  that  I  have  always  held — there  are 
many  so  minded.  It  is  a  never-failing  source 
of  wonder  to  me  that  men  are  so  quick  to  recog- 
nize the  services  of  those  who  feed  their  minds 
and  so  slow  to  acknowledge  the  debt  they  owe 
to  those  who  feed  their  bodies.  I  have  never 
regarded  cooking  in  the  light  of  mere  manual 
labor.  Labor,  it  seems  to  me,  is  work  that  is 
distasteful  and  only  performed  from  neces- 
sity; a  "labor  of  love"  seems  to  me  to  be  a  para- 
dox. Work,  on  the  contrary,  may  be  as  keen  a 
source  of  pleasure  as  recreation.  Work  may 
be  the  striving  of  an  artist  to  attain  his  ideal. 
The  very  word  "labor"  suggests  pain  and  ex- 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK       9 

haustion.  We  speak  of  an  author's  "works," 
but  who  would  think  of  referring  to  them  as  his 
"labors"? 

I  do  not  believe,  as  many  seem  to  believe, 
that  any  man  or  woman  who  can  juggle  a  skil- 
let or  wield  an  egg-beater  is  a  cook.  Merely 
to  follow  a  formula  in  a  cookery  book  does  not 
make  one  a  cook  any  more  than  the  compound- 
ing of  a  prescription  makes  one  a  physician. 
Cooking  is  an  art  as  well  as  a  science.  The  vio- 
linist can  not  express  his  personality  in  the 
strains  of  his  instrument  more  fully  than  can 
the  cook  in  his  cooking.  The  favorite  dishes  of 
a  race  are  characteristic  of  that  race.  The 
Spaniard,  like  his  chili  con  carne  and  his 
tamale,  is  hot,  peppery  and  economical.  The 
Frenchman,  like  his  many  concoctions,  is  full 
of  spice,  imagination  and  extravagance.  The 
Italian  is  indolent  and  averse  to  exertion,  as 
is  evidenced  by  his  macaroni  and  spaghetti. 
The  Englishman  is  red  and  hearty  like  his 
roast  beef.  The  German  is  fat  and  fair  like 
his  sausages.  The  Russian  is  odd  and  interest- 
ing like  his  caviar.  The  American,  like  his 


10  NEW.   BROOMS 

diet,  is  cosmopolitan.  And  as  the  cooking  of  a 
nation  or  race  is  characteristic  of  that  nation  or 
race,  so  the  cooking  of  an  individual  is  charac- 
teristic of  that  individual.  Coarse  people  do 
not  prepare  dainty  dishes.  A  cook  may  strike 
a  discord  as  surely  as  a  musician. 

To  be  a  good  cook,  a  cook  worthy  of  one's 
calling,  one  must  have  the  soul  of  an  artist. 
One  must  be  clean,  self-respecting,  industrious, 
ambitious,  earnest,  quick  to  learn  and  trained 
to  remember.  Do  other  professions  require 
more? 

The  cook  wields  a  tremendous  influence  for 
good  or  for  evil.  Over  a  good  dinner  the  most 
cynical  or  the  most  brutal  man  must  relax  into 
something  like  human  kindness.  It  is  indeed 
true  that 

"All  human  history  attests 
That  happiness   for  man, — the  hungry  sin- 
ner!— 

Since    Eve    ate    apples,    much    depends    on 
dinner!" 

If  there  be  even  the  feeblest  spark  of  charity 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK       11 

in  a  man's  breast,  a  good  dinner  will  fan  it  into 
flame.  A  bad  dinner,  on  the  other  hand,  will 
bring  to  the  surface  all  that  is  mean  and 
ignoble  in  his  nature.  Indigestion,  I  surmise, 
has  been  the  cause  of  most  of  the  cruelty  of 
men.  Viewing  history  in  this  light,  it  is  easier 
to  understand  the  apparently  wanton  slaughter 
among  barbarians.  Fed  upon  ill-conditioned 
food,  the  barbarian  is  attacked  in  his  most 
sensitive  part — his  stomach.  He  is  upset,  dis- 
trait ;  his  nerves  are  set  upon  edge  and  he  knows 
not  what  ails  him.  He  grows  irritable  and 
quick  to  anger,  and  he  wrecks  his  unreasoning 
and  unreasonable  spleen  upon  the  first  con- 
venient victim.  It  is  to  be  observed  that  the 
science  of  cookery  and  the  progress  of  civiliza- 
tion advance  together.  Well-fed  men  are  slow 
to  wrath  and  easily  appeased.  At  the  height  of 
the  Roman  civilization  the  Romans  became  epi- 
cures and  ceased  to  be  warriors.  War  has  no 
charms  for  the  man  who  is  at  peace  with  his 
own  stomach. 

It  may  be  urged  by  some  that  cooking, 
in    rendering    a    man    unwarlike,    does    him 


12  NEW   BROOMS 

an  ill  service  because  it  makes  him  effeminate. 
But  the  same  may  be  said  of  all  the  cardinal 
virtues  except,  perhaps,  bravery.  Forbearance, 
loving  kindness,  gentleness,  faith — all  these 
and  many  others  are  essentially  feminine  vir- 
tues. Nay,  civilization  itself  is  a  feminizing  in- 
fluence. Under  our  modern  civilization,  which 
as  far  as  we  know  is  the  highest  the  world  has 
ever  experienced,  men  are  reduced  to  the  con- 
dition of  dependents.  Men  no  longer  rely  upon 
their  personal  prowess  and  valor  for  redress 
for  their  injuries  or  the  defense  of  their  natural 
rights.  The  law  has  become  the  protector  of 
men,  just  as  men  were  once  the  protectors  of 
women.  And  this  feminizing  influence  of  civil- 
ization is,  I  take  it,  a  wise  provision  of  Provi- 
dence for  the  benefit  of  cookery.  The  less  men 
are  concerned  with  battle,  murder  and  sudden 
death,  the  more  they  are  concerned  with  their 
dinners;  and  the  more  solicitous  they  become 
for  their  dinners,  the  more  they  desire  the 
safety  of  the  home,  the  peace  of  nations  and 
the  prosperity  of  mankind — all  things,  in 
short,  which  help  to  make  possible  the  Perfect 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL   COOK      13 

Dinner,  perfectly  chosen,  perfectly  cooked  and 
perfectly  eaten. 

I  say  "perfectly  eaten"  because  it  seems  to 
me  that  there  is  an  art  of  eating  as  well  as  an 
art  of  cooking.  It  is  said  that  a  musician  does 
his  best  when  playing  before  an  appreciative 
audience;  and  so  the  cook  is  at  his  best  when 
cooking  for  an  appreciative  diner.  It  is  a  dis- 
couraging thing  for  an  actor  to  peep  out  from 
behind  the  drop-curtain  and  see  the  pit  all  but 
empty  of  spectators ;  but  it  is  a  heart-breaking 
experience  for  a  cook  to  peep  through  the 
swinging  doors  of  his  sanctum  sanctorum  and 
to  behold  the  diners  distant  and  indifferent,  this 
one  idly  chattering  and  that  one  buried  in  a 
late  edition  of  a  newspaper,  while  his  delicious 
soups,  his  super-excellent  omelets,  his  heart- 
warming coffee,  his  inspiring  steaks  and  his 
magnificent  pates  grow  cold  and  unpalatable 
upon  the  unregarded  plates !  To  see  one's  chef- 
d'oeuvres  treated  as  hors-d'oeuvres — that  is  a 
tragedy  of  the  soul! 

To  attain  the  Perfect  Dinner  we  must  attain 
the  Perfect  Civilization.  The  diner  must  be 


14  NEW   BROOMS 

as  free  to  enjoy  his  dinner  as  the  cook  is  to 
prepare  it;  and,  in  like  manner,  the  Perfect 
Dinner  is  the  concomitant  of  the  Perfect  Civ- 
ilization. Man  is  civilized  when  he  is  well-fed 
and  uncivilized  when  he  is  ill-fed.  This  is  a 
truth  which  you  need  not  accept  upon  my  un- 
supported authority;  any  housewife  will  tell 
you  as  much.  If  the  earth  were  to  be  visited  by 
a  plague  which  attacked  only  those  who  could 
cook  and  carried  them  off  all  at  one  time,  I  be- 
lieve that  the  world  would  relapse  into  anarchy 
in  the  space  of  thirty  days. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  profession  of  cook- 
ing is  not  at  all  incompatible  with  the  study  of 
philosophy.  As  I  apply  my  philosophy  to  my 
cooking,  so  I  apply  my  cooking  to  my  philoso- 
phy. Some  of  my  philosophers  I  take  raw,* 
some  I  boil  down  to  the  very  juice  and  some  I 
season ;  for  philosophy,  I  believe,  is  often  more 
digestible  when  taken  cum  grano  sails. 

I  may  be  wrong,  and  it  may  seem  egotistical 
in  me  to  say  it,  but  really,  Mr.  Idler >  I  believe 
that  if  more  people  were  of  my  mind  to  mix 
their  philosophy  and  their  cooking,  there  would 


A   PHILOSOPHICAL    COOK      15 

be  many  more  intelligent  cooks  and  not  a  few 
more  palatable  philosophers. 

I  am,  Sir,  your  humble  servant, 

BARTHOLOMEW  BATTERCAKE. 


A  BACHELOR  ON  WOMEN 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  have  lately  been  the  subject  of 
many  animadversions  upon  the  part  of  literary 
critics  because  of  a  novel  of  mine,  recently  pub- 
lished, which  these  critics  have  been  pleased  to 
term  "a  study  in  feminine  psychology."  My 
story  has  been  criticized  severely  and  my  ob- 
servations upon  the  female  character  merci- 
lessly condemned,  and  in  every  one  of  these  ad- 
verse criticisms  which  has  been  brought  to  my 
attention,  the  reviewer  has  taken  occasion  to 
say,  in  substance,  "This  book  was  evidently 
written  by  a  bachelor." 

Now,  the  fact  of  my  bachelorhood  I  have  no 
wish  to  deny,  nor  could  I  if  I  would,  for  it  is 
well  known  to  my  many  friends  and  acquaint- 
ances that  I  am  a  single  man.  But  is  the  fact 
that  I  am  a  bachelor  conclusive,  or  even  prima 

16 


A   BACHELOR   ON    WOMEN     17 

facie,  evidence  of  my  incompetency  to  dis- 
course upon  feminine  psychology?  I  do  not  see 
why  it  should  be  so  considered.  It  is  plain  that 
a  great  many  people  are  of  the  opinion  that  the 
man  who  has  married  a  woman  must  know 
more  of  women  in  general  than  the  man  who 
has  not.  But,  after  all  is  said,  Mr.  Idler,  why 
should  the  married  man  know  more  of  women 
than  the  bachelor  knows?  He  is  married  only 
to  one  woman — not  to  all  womankind. 

No  man  becomes  an  expert  entomologist 
through  the  study  of  one  insect.  There  is  no 
one  insect  which  can  furnish  him  with  a  gen- 
eral knowledge  of  entomology.  Nor  is  there 
any  one  woman  who  can  furnish  us  with  a  gen- 
eral knowledge  of  women.  There  is  no  one 
woman  so  typical  of  her  sex  that  all  other  wom- 
en may  be  judged  by  her.  Yet  the  only  advan- 
tage which  the  married  man  enjoys  over  the 
unmarried  man  is  his  intimate  knowledge  of 
one  particular  woman.  The  married  man  has 
not  the  same  liberty  of  observing  women  which 
is  the  perquisite  of  the  bachelor.  The  only  time 


18  NEW   BROOMS 

when  a  married  man  has  an  opportunity  to  ob- 
serve women  other  than  his  wife  is  when  his 
wife  is  not  with  him,  and  then,  for  a  short  time, 
he  possesses  the  same  degree  of  liberty  which 
the  bachelor  enjoys  all  of  the  time.  The  bache- 
lor observes,  not  one  woman,  but  many.  It  is 
true  that  his  knowledge  of  women  differs  from 
that  of  the  married  man  in  one  particular:  if 
he  has  any  intimate  knowledge  of  woman  at 
her  worst  it  is  likely  to  be  a  knowledge  of  Judy 
O'Grady,  rather  than  of  the  colonel's  lady. 
The  bachelor  sees  good  women  at  their  best  and 
bad  women  at  their  worst.  The  married  man 
sees  one  good  woman  at  her  best  and  at  her 
worst. 

The  question,  then,  is,  which  sort  of  knowl- 
edge is  more  likely  to  enable  a  man  to  form  a 
just  estimate  of  the  female  character?  Per- 
sonally, I  think  the  bachelor  has  all  the  best  of 
it.  And,  Sir,  if  none  of  these  arguments  has 
weight  with  you,  there  remains  one  supreme 
argument  which  proves  that  the  bachelor  knows 
more  of  women  than  the  married  man,  and 


that,  Sir,  is  the  simple  fact  that  he  is  a  bache- 
lor, as  I  am,  Sir, 

FORTTJNATAS  FREEMAN. 

N.  B.  The  editor  disclaims  all  responsibil- 
ity for  the  sentiments  expressed  in  the  above 
communication. 


ON  PENSIONING  WRITERS 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  observe  by  the  daily  press  that 
the  English  government  has  just  issued  a  list 
in  full  of  such  authors  as  have  been  selected 
for  the  receipt  of  a  pension.  In  this  list  I  find 
the  names  of  a  number  of  widows  and  orphans 
of  authors  as  well  as  the  names  of  living  au- 
thors, and  this  is  no  doubt  as  it  should  be.  I 
have  heard  certain  hypercritical  persons  object 
to  the  late  project  of  the  "Dickens  stamp" 
upon  the  ground  that  no  man  is  entitled  to  any- 
thing which  he  has  not  earned  and  that  literary 
heirs  are  entitled  to  no  more  consideration  than 
monetary  heirs.  Now,  personally,  I  can  not 
understand  what  is  so  objectionable  about  the 
inheritance  of  money.  It  seems  to  me  that  a 
man's  heirs  are  quite  as  much  entitled  to  receive 
the  benefits  of  his  fortune  or  the  fruits  of  his 
industry  after  his  death  as  they  are  during  his 

20 


ON    PENSIONING   WRITERS    21 

life ;  and  no  one  has  yet  gone  so  far  as  to  say 
that  a  man  may  not,  with  perfect  propriety,  be- 
stow upon  his  heirs  and  relatives  such  pecu- 
niary gifts  and  benefits  as  he  may  see  fit  dur- 
ing his  lifetime.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  heirs 
of  an  author  inherit  as  great  an  interest  in  his 
work  as  the  heirs  of  a  banker  or  broker.  But, 
however  this  may  be,  there  is  one  feature  about 
this  pensioning  of  authors  which  convinces  me 
that  the  British  government  has  gone  about  the 
matter  in  a  very  wrong  fashion. 

I  find  in  looking  over  the  list  that  pensions 
have  been  granted  because  of  writings  upon 
ornithology,  Elizabethan  literature,  poetry,  so- 
cialism, philosophy  and  so  on.  While  I  must 
confess  that  I  am  unfamiliar  with  the  majority 
of  the  names  which  appear  upon  the  list,  I  as- 
sume from  the  manner  in  which  they  have  been 
selected  that  the  British  government  considers 
their  work  to  have  been  of  really  great  value, 
although  not  popular.  The  British  govern- 
ment, in  fact,  appears  to  be  offering  encour- 
agement, in  the  shape  of  pensions,  to  such 
writers  as  can  not  hope  to  please  the  general 


22  NEW    BROOMS 

public  with  their  work.  The  government  is 
supplying  a  pension  in  lieu  of  popular  appre- 
ciation. 

Now,  this  is  all  very  well  if  the  government 
is  merely  going  into  the  business  of  being  phi- 
lanthropic and  is  willing  to  extend  its  system 
of  pensions  to  include  worthy  shoemakers  who 
have  been  unable  to  secure  a  sufficient  custom 
to  keep  them  in  food  and  clothing  because  of 
the  inroads  made  upon  the  cobbler's  trade  by 
the  manufacturers  of  machine-made  shoes; 
lawyers  who  are  learned  in  the  law,  but  who 
have  been  unable  to  secure  the  business  of  the 
great  corporations;  doctors  who  are  efficient, 
but  who  chance  to  live  in  unusually  healthy 
neighborhoods;  ministers  of  the  Gospel  who 
are  unfortunately  assigned  to  meager  or  irre- 
ligious parishes ;  music  teachers  who  are  excel- 
lent instructors,  but  who  find  formidable  foes 
to  business  in  the  automatic  piano  and  the  pho- 
nograph. If  the  British  government  is  bent 
upon  making  up  for  public  indifference  to  such 
authors  as  are  willing  to  benefit  mankind,  but 
who  can  not  make  mankind  take  note  of  their 


ON    PENSIONING   WRITERS    23 

efforts  in  that  direction,  then,  I  say,  the  British 
government  shows  a  kindly  and  courteous  dis- 
position, but  it  should  not  stop  with  authors ;  it 
should  carry  on  the  good  work  in  every  walk 
of  life. 

But  if,  as  I  suspect  to  be  the  case,  the  British 
government  is  establishing  this  system  of  pen- 
sions in  the  hope  that  the  system  will  result  in 
more  and  better  books,  then  I  must  say  I  think 
the  system  is  more  likely  to  fail  than  to  succeed. 

One  has  but  to  glance  back  at  the  history  of 
literature  to  be  convinced  that  poverty  has 
never  been  an  effective  check  upon  literary 
genius.  Poets  have  starved  and  philosophers 
have  gone  about  clad  in  shabby  raiment  rather 
than  forsake  their  chosen  work.  Herbert 
Spencer  did  not  go  clad  in  rags,  to  be  sure,  but 
where  mediocre  writers  were  reaping  fortunes 
from  their  literary  labors,  he  was  expending 
fortunes  in  the  effort  to  bring  his  philosophy 
to  the  attention  of  the  world.  Doctor  Johnson 
never  wrote  so  prolifically  or  so  well  as  when 
he  was  starving  in  a  Grub  Street  garret. 

An  empty  stomach  does  not  mean  an  empty 


24  KEW    BROOMS 

head  where  authors  are  concerned.  The  fact  of 
the  matter  is,  it  is  easier  for  men  to  write  great 
poetry  and  to  think  deeply  when  they  are  poor 
than  when  they  are  well-to-do.  A  wealthy  and 
famous  man  has  to  suffer  innumerable  distrac- 
tions from  the  work  he  has  in  hand;  his  time 
and  attention  are  not  his  own  to  command.  At 
every  turn  he  is  harassed  by  the  responsibilities 
of  his  position.  In  obscurity  and  poverty,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  man  is  not  only  brought  more 
closely  in  touch  with  life,  but  he  is  absolute 
master  of  his  own  time  and  effort.  Providing 
he  be  not  married,  and  so  responsible  for  others, 
the  obscure  and  poor  author  is  absolutely  his 
own  master.  Whether  he  drop  his  greater  work 
for  the  sake  of  earning  a  meal  is  a  matter 
which  is  entirely  optional.  He  does  not  have 
to  eat  if  he  does  not  care  to  do  so.  The  rich  and 
successful  author,  on  the  contrary,  is  expected 
to  observe  certain  social  duties  and  to  return 
courtesy  for  praise  and  patronage.  If  he  treats 
his  public  cavalierly  and  refuses  to  admit  him- 
self bound  by  the  amenities  of  ordinary  life,  he 


ON    PENSIONING   WRITERS    25 

is  in  grave  danger  of  losing  both  his  popularity 
and  his  eminence. 

"O  Poverty,"  wrote  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau, 
"thou  art  a  severe  teacher.  But  at  thy  noble 
school  I  have  received  more  precious  lessons,  I 
have  learned  more  great  truths  than  I  shall  ever 
find  in  the  spheres  of  wealth." 

Had  Louis  the  Little  actually  taken  up 
Fra^ois  Villon  from  his  squalor  and  wretched- 
ness, his  stews  and  taverns,  his  thieves  and  slat- 
terns, and  made  him  the  Grand  Marshal  of 
France,  as  he  is  made  to  do  in  Justin  Huntley 
McCarthy's  romance,  //  I  Were  King,  he 
would  have  spoiled  a  good  poet  to  make  a  poor 
courtier.  When  poor  and  writing  for  posterity, 
the  author  is  at  his  best ;  when  rich  and  writing 
for  more  money,  he  is  usually  so  anxious  to 
make  hay  while  the  sun  shines  that  his  work 
suffers  in  proportion  to  his  output.  No,  pov- 
erty has  never  spoiled  a  good  poet — even  the 
youthful  Chatterton  might  have  lost  his  magic 
with  the  disillusionment  which  follows  on  the 
heels  of  affluence. 


26  NEW   BROOMS 

And  since  the  really  great  authors  can  not 
be  kept  from  writing  in  any  case,  it  would  seem 
to  me  that  a  much  better  scheme  would  be  to 
pension  those  who  were  better  idle.  Let  the 
British  government  pension,  not  the  good  au- 
thors, but  the  bad.  Let  the  penny-a-liner  be 
retired  in  comfort  where  he  will  never  need  to 
write  another  poem,  novel,  play  or  philosophic 
treatise.  Since  the  inspiration  which  moves  him 
to  labor  is  the  desire  for  money,  when  he  has 
the  money  he  will  no  longer  have  any  tempta- 
tion to  write.  But  for  the  great  authors,  who 
will  write  whether  or  no,  let  them  be  kept  on 
their  mettle,  stung  to  action  by  "the  slings  and 
arrows  of  outrageous  fortune,"  inspired  by 
their  faith  in  their  work  and  close  to  the  hearts 
of  humanity,  so  that  they  may  continue  to  pour 
out  the  riches  of  literature,  philosophy  and  sci- 
ence, unimpeded  by  the  obligations  and  worries 
attendant  upon  the  possession  of  a  bank  ac- 
count! 

I  am,  Sir, 

A  LOVER  OF  LITERATURE. 


A  PURITIAN  IN  BOHEMIA 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  You  will  often  hear  it  asserted 
by  those  who  assume  to  speak  with  authority, 
that  there  is  no  longer  any  such  thing  as  Bo- 
hemia in  New  York;  that  the  Bohemians  are 
scattered  hither  and  thither  and  that  their 
haunts  are  given  over  to  seekers  after  sensation, 
sight-seers  and  the  like.  The  seeming  sophisti- 
cation of  those  who  speak  thus  is,  more  often 
than  not,  entirely  sham,  and  is  assumed  by  pert 
reporters  for  the  daily  press  who  wish,  by  ap- 
pearing worldly,  to  divert  attention  from  their 
patent  callowness  and  youth. 

There  isf  Sir,  such  a  thing  as  Bohemia,  and 
there  are  such  people  as  Bohemians,  and  this  I 
know  to  my  sorrow,  and  the  way  in  which  I  dis- 
covered this  I  shall  presently  relate.  Bohemia, 
as  I  have  found  it,  is  not  a  place,  but  a  state  of 
mind  and  a  manner  of  life.  The  Bohemians 

27 


28  NEW   BROOMS 

have  a  fixed  abode  no  more  than  the  Arabs  of 
the  desert  or  the  wild  tribes  of  Tartary.  If  one 
of  their  citadels  is  wrested  from  them  by  the 
invasion  of  the  Philistines,  they  fall  back  upon 
another,  and  being,  for  the  most  part,  unen- 
cumbered with  Lares  and  Penates,  they  have 
no  difficulty  in  rinding  another  retreat  in  which 
they  are  soon  as  happy  and  content  as  in  the 
one  which  they  formerly  occupied.  They  may 
be  said  to  be  a  people  without  attachments  (if 
we  except  the  writs  so  called  by  those  of  the 
legal  profession),  and  if  they  pay  devotion  to 
any  god,  I  know  not  whom  it  may  be,  unless,  in- 
deed, Bacchus,  who  was  always  a  roving  deity, 
as  like  to  be  found  in  one  spot  as  another, 
whose  chief  attributes  are  liberty  and  license, 
and  whose  rites,  therefore,  may  be  celebrated 
wherever  his  devotees  are  given  the  liberty  of 
a  place  that  has  a  license. 

But  do  not  let  me,  by  the  use  of  these  terms, 
lead  you  to  fall  into  the  vulgar  error  that  these 
Bohemians  are  people  without  conventions  and 
who  observe  no  rules  of  conduct,  but  act  solely 
according  to  the  whim  of  the  moment,  for  in- 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     29 

deed  the  contrary  is  the  case.  The  Bohemians, 
Sir,  are  as  jealous  of  their  customs  and  conven- 
tions as  any  class  of  people,  and  they  even  have 
certain  ideas  of  caste  to  which  they  adhere  as 
rigidly  as  the  most  fanatical  of  the  Hindus. 
To  lose  caste  in  Bohemia  is  like  losing  one's 
"face"  among  the  Chinese  and  results  in  ostra- 
cism quite  as  surely. 

The  customs  and  conventions  of  the  Bohe- 
mians, as  I  shall  presently  show,  are,  in  truth, 
very  different  from  the  customs  and  the  con- 
ventions of  what  is  known  as  "good  society"; 
so  that  it  is  not  surprising  that  those  who  have 
only,  so  to  speak,  touched  upon  the  frontiers 
of  this  country  of  the  imagination,  should  de- 
clare it  to  be  a  land  of  absolute  freedom  and  of 
individualistic  philosophy.  Myself,  when  I 
first  came  among  them,  was  as  astonished  and 
confused  as  Gulliver  among  the  Houyhnhnms, 
for  here  I  found  everything  turned  about 
from  the  manner  in  which  I  was  used  to  seeing 
it.  That  which  I  had  been  accustomed  to  con- 
sider worthy,  I  found  here  to  be  unworthy,  and 
that  which  I  had  been  taught  to  hold  a  fault  I 


30  NEW   BROOMS 

found  here  to  be  a  virtue.  I  had  been  taught 
to  admire  thrift,  but  here  I  found  it  held  to  be 
the  meanest  of  qualities.  The  Beau  Ideal  of  a 
Bohemian  I  discovered  to  be  the  young  man 
who  is  free  with  his  purse  and  careless  of  his 
obligations.  I  found  it  a  humorous  thing  to 
defraud  one's  creditors  but  a  shameful  thing 
to  deny  one's  purse  to  a  fellow  Bohemian.  I 
had  been  taught  to  be  circumspect  in  my  con- 
versation with  the  ladies,  but  here  I  found 
them  conversing  upon  all  subjects  with  utter 
freedom  and  an  entire  lack  of  embarrassment. 
I  had  been  used  to  admire  innocence,  but  here 
I  found  that  innocence  was  considered  as  ig- 
norance and  a  subject  for  mirth  or  censure. 
Religion,  patriotism,  respect  for  established 
customs,  reverence  for  those  in  power — all 
those  things,  in  short,  which  had  been  so  care- 
fully impressed  upon  me  at  home,  I  found  to 
be  nowhere  admired  among  these  people. 

To  acquaint  you  briefly  with  the  manner  of 
my  coming  among  these  citizens :  I  fell  among 
them  by  design  and  not,  as  you  may  have  sup- 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     31 

posed,  by  accident.  Possessed  of  some  talent 
in  a  musical  way  and  having  something  of  a 
turn  for  original  composition,  I  had  secured  a 
position  in  an  orchestra  in  one  of  the  local  the- 
aters. Though  I  had  been  brought  up  in 
the  most  orthodox  manner  by  my  father,  who 
was  a  professor  in  a  small  New  England 
college,  I  chafed  under  the  restrictions  of 
social  life  in  my  native  village,  where  intellec- 
tual attainments  were  held  in  such  high  repute 
as  to  overshadow  completely  all  natural  talent 
and  genius,  and  where  a  man  was  more  re- 
spected for  knowing  Boethius  than  for  know- 
ing beans.  I  had  neither  taste  nor  inclination 
for  pedagogy,  but  yearned  with  all  my  heart 
for  the  artistic  life.  I  had,  in  short,  a  some- 
what exaggerated  attack  of  what  is  known  as 
the  artistic  temperament,,  and  finding  that  my 
own  people  considered  music  as  a  parlor  accom- 
plishment rather  than  a  serious  art,  I  was  more 
than  ever  impatient  of  their  narrow-minded 
Puritanism  and  more  than  ever  determined  to 
leave  the  little  college  town  and  all  that  it 


32  NEW    BROOMS 

stood  for,  and  to  go  out  into  the  world  to  seek 
companionship  with  those  who  shared  my  own 
ideals  and  ambitions. 

The  final  rupture  with  my  people  came 
when  I  announced  to  my  father  my  intention 
of  becoming1  a  professional  violinist,  and  he 
replied  that  if  I  were  determined  to  disappoint 
his  hopes  of  my  future  I  might  at  least  have 
hit  upon  something  respectable,  and  not 
brought  upon  him  the  reproach  of  having  a 
fiddler  in  the  family.  "I  can  only  hope,"  said 
he,  "that  you  will  be  a  total  and  abject  failure 
in  your  misguided  efforts,  for  if  you  were  to 
succeed  and  I  were  to  come  upon  your  name 
flaunted  in  shameless  fashion  from  the  boards 
of  some  play-house,  I  should  certainly  die  of 
mortification."  With  these  good  wishes  ring- 
ing in  my  ears,  I  packed  my  meager  belong- 
ings, tucked  my  violin  case  under  my  arm  and 
turned  my  back  upon  my  native  village  and 
respectability,  as  I  thought,  forever. 

A  few  weeks  of  playing  in  the  orchestra  at 
a  theater  convinced  me  that  I  had  yet  to  seek 
the  intellectual  sympathy  for  which  I  left 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     33 

home.  My  fellow  players,  with  one  exception, 
were  all  phlegmatic  Germans  who  played  well 
enough,  to  be  sure,  but  who  appeared  to  be  as 
devoid  of  spiritual  aspirations  and  artistic  ap- 
preciation as  so  many  day-laborers.  They 
worked  at  their  music  as  a  barber  works  at  his 
trade,  and  when  the  evening's  task  was  done, 
they  retired  to  a  corner  saloon  where  they 
drank  beer,  ate  Limburger  and  talked  politics 
like  so  many  grocers.  There  was,  as  I  have 
said,  one  exception ;  a  young  man  like  myself, 
who  seemed  to  scorn  the  middle-class  ideas  and 
ideals  of  our  companions  and  who  never  joined 
in  the  beer-drinking  or  the  political  discussions 
at  the  corner.  This  young  man,  said  I  to  my- 
self, has  been  here  for  some  time,  and  he,  if 
any  one,  should  be  able  to  direct  me  to  the 
haunts  of  the  true  friends  of  art;  he,  of  all 
these,  is  the  only  one  fitted  to  act  as  my  guide, 
philosopher  and  friend. 

Timidly  I  approached  him  upon  the  subject 
nearest  to  my  heart,  and  heartily  he  replied  that 
not  only  could  he  introduce  me  into  the  free- 
masonry of  art,  but  that  he  would  do  so  the 


34  NEW    BROOMS 

very  next  night.  Accordingly,  when  the  cur- 
tain fell  the  following  evening,  we  set  off  at 
once  and  arrived  shortly  at  a  restaurant  and 
cafe,  upon  the  East  Side,  which  was  situated 
in  a  basement.  A  large  wooden  sign  pro- 
claimed it  to  be  "Weinstein's  Rathskeller,"  but 
my  companion  assured  me  that  it  was  known 
to  the  elect  as  the  "Cafe  of  the  Innocents,"  be- 
cause those  who  came  there  were  yet  young 
and  comparatively  unknown  in  the  world  of 
art  and  letters. 

To  describe  my  sensations  upon  that  even- 
ing, Sir,  would  require  the  pen  of  a  Verlaine. 
My  own  poor  efforts  can  never  do  them  justice. 
I  can  make  shift  to  express  emotion  upon  the 
strings  of  my  instrument,  but  when  I  exchange 
my  bow  for  a  pen  my  fingers  become  as  thumbs 
and  my  emotions  defy  expression,  so  that  I  am 
as  helpless  as  a  six  weeks'  infant  plagued  by  a 
pin,  and  can  no  more  make  clear  my  meaning 
than  a  sign-painter  could  imitate  Rubens. 

Suffice  it  to  say  that  I  was  overcome, 
charmed,  enchanted!  In  stepping  through  the 
portals  of  that  dingy  East  Side  resort,  I 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     35 

seemed  to  have  stepped  over  the  border-line 
that  divides  the  world  of  the  dull  and  the  prac- 
tical from  the  world  of  romance  and  desire.  I 
had  entered  the  land  of  dreams,  the  country  of 
magnificent  distances!  I  was  as  astonished  as 
William  Guppy  would  have  been  had  he  stum- 
bled unwittingly  into  the  rose  garden  of  Hafiz. 
Here  were  men,  and  women  after  my  own 
heart ;  men  and  women  who  saw  the  world  as  a 
whole,  unbounded  by  the  petty  lines  of  coun- 
ties, states  and  nations.  Here  the  names  of  the 
masters  of  art  and  literature  were  bandied 
about  as  familiarly  as  the  names  of  our  local 
professors  were  at  home.  Here  were  lights, 
here  music,  and  here  the  good  glad  laughter 
of  youth!  Here  were  women — not  the  slim 
spinsters  and  prim  matrons  that  I  had  known, 
but  hearty  healthy  women  who  seemed  to  be 
alive.  Ah,  that  was  it — they  were  all,  all  of 
them,  so  much  alive!  Between  their  fingers 
they  held,  not  knitting-needles,  but  dainty 
cigarettes!  Here  was  wine,  wit  and  winsome- 
ness — a  dangerous,  a  deadly  combination  for 
such  as  I ! 


36  NEW   BROOMS 

Well,  Sir,  to  be  brief,  I  was  enthralled.  I 
grew  so  greedy  of  that  atmosphere  that  I  be- 
gan to  begrudge  my  work  the  hours  that  it 
called  me  away  from  such  good  company.  Fi- 
nally I  exchanged  my  place  at  the  theater  for 
a  position  in  the  orchestra  at  the  cafe.  And  so 
I  came  to  live  among  the  Bohemians  and  be- 
come one  of  them. 

From  the  first  I  was  enamored  of  the  con- 
versation of  these  stepchildren  of  Genius,  and 
I  soon  began  descending  from  the  platform 
and  mingling  with  the  habitues  of  the  place; 
for  at  Weinstein's  the  only  snobbery  is  of  the 
Bohemian  variety,  and  those  who  would  blush 
to  be  seen  dining  with  a  prosperous  bourgeois, 
were  not  at  all  averse  to  drinking  with  an  hum- 
ble member  of  the  orchestra — for  was  not  I, 
too,  an  artist?  It  was  not  long  before  I  began 
to  care  more  for  talking  of  my  art  than  for 
practising  it,  and  all  the  time  that  I  was  play- 
ing I  was  impatient  to  be  down  among  the 
tables  enjoying  the  praise  which  my  perform- 
ance, or,  as  I  am  now  inclined  to  suspect,  the 
subsequent  order  for  drinks,  never  failed  to 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     37 

secure.  Thus  I  ceased  to  practise  and  played 
no  more  except  when  I  was  at  work. 

Of  course  I  did  not  come  to  realize  all  this 
in  a  moment. 

It  was  some  months  before  I  woke  from  the 
daze  into  which  I  fell  at  the  first.  It  came  to 
me  gradually  as  I  began  to  make  unpleasant 
discoveries.  It  was  disconcerting  to  find  that  I 
had  fled  my  own  world  to  escape  conventions 
only  to  come  upon  others,  or  rather  upon  the 
same  lot,  turned  topsy-turvy.  It  annoyed  me 
to  find  that  to  be  accounted  a  true  Bohemian 
one  must  hold  only  certain  views,  and  those  al- 
ways opposed  to  the  views  of  acknowledged 
authorities;  that  one  must  not  dress  too  well, 
eat  too  well  or  drink  too  well.  Which  was  not 
at  all  the  same  thing  as  saying  too  much.  But 
this  was  by  no  means  the  most  shocking  of  my 
disillusions.  I  soon  learned  that  while  the  Bo- 
hemians are  forever  talking  and  thinking  of 
success  and  wishing  success  for  their  friends, 
the  moment  one  of  them  really  succeeds  he  is 
no  longer  a  member  of  the  company;  and  for 
this  reason  it  is  said,  with  some  truth,  that  there. 


38  NEW   BROOMS 

are  no  successful  Bohemians.  When  one  of 
them  who  has  made  a  marked  success  intrudes 
himself  into  the  old  gathering  place,  he  is 
given  such  a  cold  shoulder  that  he  never  ven- 
tures there  again.  A  small  triumph  furnishes 
the  occasion  for  a  feast  of  congratulation,  but 
a  real  "arrival"  excites  the  whole  company  to 
sneers  and  innuendoes,  so  that  such  felicitations 
as  are  offered  are  bitter  with  envy.  They  have 
a  sort  of  optimism  of  their  own,  but  it  is  all  a 
personal  optimism.  Each  one  hopes  and  be- 
lieves that  he  will  succeed,  but  each  one  believes 
and  secretly  hopes  that  the  others  will  not.  A 
cynical  smile  and  a  shrugging  of  shoulders 
is  the  tribute  to  the  absent  artist. 

Well,  Mr.  Idler,  the  longer  I  remained 
among  these  people,  the  more  I  came  to  be  of 
the  mind  of  Alice  in  Wonderland,  that  though 
some  may  be  marked  off  from  the  pack  and 
may  look  like  kings  and  queens,  they  are  noth- 
ing but  playing-cards  after  all. 

But  there  was  one  young  woman  who  held 
my  waning  interest  and  who  bound  me  by  sen- 
timental ties  to  the  life  of  which  I  now  began 


A   PURITAN    IN   BOHEMIA     39 

to  be  somewhat  weary.  If  I  had  not  made  her 
acquaintance  I  believe  that  I  should  long  ago 
have  left  Bohemia  and  shaken  the  sawdust  of 
Weinstein's  from  my  feet.  She  was  a  demure 
young  person,  a  newcomer  from  the  West,  who 
was  studying  art.  She  seemed  so  different 
from  the  others,  so  fresh,  so  ingenuous,  that  I 
could  not  but  believe  her  to  be  genuine.  She 
smoked  her  cigarette  and  drank  of  the  table 
d'hote  wine,  it  is  true  (she  could  do  no  less  in 
the  face  of  Bohemian  convention),  but  she  did 
it  all  with  such  a  pretty  air  of  youth  and  inno- 
cence as  touched  me  greatly.  For  I  was  by 
now  as  strongly  attracted  by  a  quiet  woman  as 
I  had  formerly  been  by  a  lively  one. 

To  spare  you  a  tedious  recital  of  my  passion, 
I  determined  to  ask  her  to  marry  me,  thinking 
that  she  might  arouse  in  me  the  old  ambition  to 
become  a  great  musician — the  ambition  which 
my  long  sojourn  in  the  Lotus  land  of  Bohemia 
had  all  but  killed.  And  so  one  night  I  put  the 
question  gently  over  our  cups  of  black  coffee, 
asking  her,  "Would  you — could  you — share 
with  me  my  career?"  Then,  Sir,  that  happened 


40  NEW    BROOMS 

which  you  will  scarce  believe.  Yes,  she  said, 
she  would  be  glad  to  share  my  career  with  me, 
but  I  must  be  under  no  misapprehension;  she 
could  not  marry  me ;  she  already  had  a  husband 
in  the  West;  but  inasmuch  as  she  had  not  seen 
him  in  three  years  and  had  never  found  him 
very  congenial  in  any  case,  he  need  not  in  any 
way  interfere  with  our  plans. 

As  you  may  imagine,  I  was  thunderstruck. 
I  concealed  my  confusion  as  best  I  might  by 
pretending  to  choke  upon  a  bit  of  cheese,  and 
at  the  first  opportunity  I  made  my  escape  and 
sought  the  seclusion  of  my  chamber  where  I 
faced  my  problem.  I  had  striven  to  become  a 
Bohemian,  but  I  had  been  born  a  Puritan  and 
there  was  a  limit  to  my  acquired  unconvention- 
ality.  I  could  not  confess  my  prudery  to  the 
lady;  could  not  ignore  the  incident.  Therefore 
I  have  determined  to  accept  the  one  course 
left  open  to  me.  I  shall  fly.  I  am  now  going 
out  to  pawn  my  fiddle  and  with  the  money  I 
get  I  shall  buy  me  a  ticket  to  that  little  New 
England  town  where  I  first  saw  the  light  of 
day. 


Others  may  seek  for  inspiration  at  the  Cafe 
of  the  Innocents,  but  as  for  me,  I  am  going 
where  a  modest  young  man  may  live  in  the  pro- 
tection of  the  old-fashioned  conventions.  I  am 
going  where  I  can  be  moral  without  being 
queer.  I  am  going  home.  And  so,  Sir, 
Farewell, 

TIMOTHY  TIMID. 


AN  ARRAIGNMENT  OF  ORIGINALITY 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  am,  I  doubt  not,  one  of  your 
most  devoted  readers,  and  the  reason  of  my 
devotion,  if  I  may  say  so,  is  because  you  so  sel- 
dom say  anything  original.  Nay,  Sir,  this  is 
not  said  in  jest,  but  in  very  earnest,  for  in 
truth  I  am  vastly  wearied  of  originality  in  all 
its  forms.  We  are  so  beset  upon  all  sides  by 
"originals"  of  one  sort  or  another,  that  it  is  a 
positive  relief  to  open  a  book  or  pick  up  a 
magazine  which  is  decently  dull  and  warranted 
harmless.  To  sit  down  for  a  quiet  evening 
with  one  of  our  sensational  monthlies  is  like 
lighting  one's  self  to  bed  with  a  giant  cracker 
— there  is  no  peace  or  quiet  to  be  had  with  'em. 

From  my  earliest  youth  it  has  been  my  am- 
bition to  keep  myself  well  informed  of  the  af- 
fairs of  the  day,  and  to  this  end  I  have  made  it 
a  practise  to  glance  at  least  through  the 

42 


ORIGINALITY  43 

monthly  numbers  of  our  popular  magazines.  I 
regret  to  say  that  I  have  been  compelled  to 
break  off  this  lifelong  habit,  as  my  physician 
has  strongly  advised  me  against  continuing  it. 
The  startling  and  alarming  articles  which 
make  up  the  bulk  of  the  month's  offerings  in 
these  periodicals  have  a  very  bad  effect  upon 
my  heart  and  my  imagination.  More  than  once 
in  the  last  two  or  three  years  I  have  been  trou- 
bled with  evil  dreams  and  nightmares  brought 
on  by  reading  these  publications  shortly  before 
going  to  bed.  More  than  this,  I  am  by  nature 
somewhat  irritable  and  short  of  temper,  and  I 
have  been  thrown  into  a  very  fury  of  indigna- 
tion upon  reading  the  recital  of  my  wrongs  in 
these  magazines;  so  much  so,  indeed,  that  I 
have  narrowly  escaped  apoplexy,  a  disease 
to  which,  my  doctor  says,  I  am  peculiarly  lia- 
ble. And  since  I  had  rather  be  swindled  upon 
every  hand,  as  long  as  it  is  in  happy  ignorance, 
than  to  die  of  indignation,  I  have  left  off  read- 
ing them  altogether. 

I  can  say  without  dissimulation  that  I  do  not 
miss  them  greatly.    To  say  the  truth,  I  have 


44  NEW   BROOMS 

small  fondness  for  the  originality  which  is 
everywhere  urged  upon  us  in  these  days.  I 
have  small  patience  with  the  spirit  which  drives 
us  on  from  one  extravagance  to  another  until 
there  is  no  telling  to  what  base  uses  the  human 
intellect  may  eventually  fall.  Sir,  I  have  taken 
it  upon  myself  to  raise  my  voice  in  protest 
against  the  prevalent  craze  for  originality  and 
to  say  a  word,  which  needs  to  be  said,  in  de- 
fense of  imitation.  If  in  so  doing  I  am  unin- 
tentionally original,  I  can  only  crave  your  in- 
dulgence. 

If  I  read  the  signs  of  the  times  aright,  we 
are  in  imminent  danger  of  falling  into  the 
ways  of  the  Greeks,  "ever  seeking  some  new 
thing" ;  considering  in  our  art,  music  and  liter- 
ature not  the  qualities  of  beauty,  sense  and 
melody,  but  only  the  quality  of  newness,  which 
is  to  say,  novelty.  We  do  not  ask  of  a  musician, 
is  his  work  harmonious?  But  only,  is  it  differ- 
ent? We  do  not  ask  of  a  painter,  is  he  artistic? 
But  only,  is  he  clever?  We  do  not  ask  of  an 
author,  is  he  sound?  But  only,  is  he  witty?  Is 
it  not  a  sad  commentary  upon  our  insane  desire 


ORIGINALITY  45 

for  change,  Mr.  Idler,  that  our  artists,  mu- 
sicians and  authors  should  urge  only  these 
claims  upon  our  consideration,  that  they  are 
different,  clever  and  witty?  Sir,  the  music  of 
an  Ojibway  Indian  is  different;  a  sign-painter 
may  well  be  clever;  and  the  most  ignorant 
street  urchins  are  often  witty.  Are  these,  then, 
the  only  qualities  we  should  seek  in  those  who 
presume  to  instruct  and  elevate  the  human 
mind  and  soul?  Are  we  to  pass  by  sound  sense 
for  the  sake  of  empty  wit?  Are  we  to  forsake 
harmony  for  the  novelty  of  a  mad  jumble  of 
absurd  sounds  ?  Are  we  to  value  cartoons  above 
masterpieces? 

For  a  convenient  example  of  the  depths  to 
which  we  have  sunk,  let  me  cite  you,  Sir,  the 
case  of  dancing.  Dancing  was,  I  believe,  orig- 
inally a  religious  exercise.  Like  music,  it  was 
employed  to  express  the  nobler  emotions  of  the 
soul.  I  confess  that  it  may  have  been  sensuous, 
even  at  a  very  early  date,  but  the  most  sensuous 
dance  of  the  ancients,  the  bacchante,  was,  nev- 
ertheless, performed  in  honor  of  a  god.  In  the 
minuet  of  our  grandfathers  there  was  both 


46  NEW   BROOMS 

dignity  and  grace.  There,  Sir,  was  such  a 
dance  as  might  enhance  the  noble  bearing,  the 
beauty  and  the  gentility  of  those  who  danced 
it.  There  was  a  dance  fit  for  ladies  and  gentle- 
men, a  dance  which  had  in  it  nothing  incom- 
patible with  innocent  womanliness  or  manly 
dignity.  Who,  let  me  ask  you,  can  say  as  much 
for  the  unspeakable  modern  original  dances, 
the  kangaroo,  the  grizzly  bear,  and  the  bunny 
hug?  Sir,  can  you  bring  yourself  for  one  mo- 
ment to  think  upon  the  spectacle  of  George 
Washington  dancing  the  kangaroo?  Can  you 
conceive  of  such  an  unthinkable  thing  as 
Henry  Clay  performing  the  grizzly  bear?  Can 
you,  by  any  force  of  imagination,  picture 
Abraham  Lincoln  lost  in  the  mazes  of  the 
bunny  hug?  God  forbid! 

As  it  is  with  dancing,  so  it  is  with  art.  The 
poster  insanity  has  hardly  passed  away  and  we 
are  already  overwhelmed  with  a  horde  of  sym- 
bolists of  one  sort  or  another,  who  appear  to 
agree  upon  one  point  only — that  pictures 
should  not  in  any  way  resemble  nature.  These 


ORIGINALITY  47 

ambitious  daubers,  Sir — I  can  not  bring  my- 
self to  call  them  artists — have  the  impertinence 
to  assume  that  they  can  express  life  more  fully 
and  clearly  upon  their  hideous  canvases  than 
the  Author  of  the  Universe  has  expressed  it  in 
nature.  As  to  the  absurdity  of  their  preten- 
sions, I  need  say  nothing;  it  is  apparent  to  all 
who  can  lay  claim  to  even  the  most  ordinary 
degree  of  intelligence.  But  as  to  the  effect  this 
nonsense  has  upon  the  weak,  the  easily  im- 
pressed, I  could  never  say  enough.  This  insan- 
ity has  spread  like  a  plague  from  painting  to 
poetry,  and  from  poetry  to  all  the  arts  that  are 
known.  Originality,  like  charity,  is  made  to 
cover  a  multitude  of  sins.  The  creative  artist 
who  has  not  the  strength  or  the  patience  to  win 
distinction  along  recognized  lines  produces 
something  that  is  grotesque  and  defies  us  to 
criticize  his  work,  saying,  "There  is  no  stand- 
ard by  which  you  can  measure  this,  for  it  is  ab- 
solutely new.  Nobody  ever  did  anything  just 
like  this  before."  The  obvious  retort  to  this 
would  be  that  nobody  ever  wanted  to  do  any- 


48  NEW   BROOMS 

thing  like  it  before,  but  this  would  be  lost  upon 
the  artist,  for  the  "original"  of  to-day  is  as  im- 
pervious to  ridicule  as  he  is  to  criticism. 

That  music  is  better  for  being  original,  I  do 
not  believe.  Such  an  assumption  is  without 
warrant  in  nature.  There  is  no  purer  sweeter 
melody  than  that  of  the  birds.  What  says  the 
poet? 

"Hark!  that's  the  nightingale, 
Telling  the  self -same  tale 
Her  song  told  when  this  ancient  earth 

was  young: 
So  echoes  answered  when  her  song  was 

sung 
In  the  first  wooded  vale." 

Year  after  year,  century  after  century,  these 
natural  musicians  continue  to  ravish  and  de- 
light all  mankind  with  those  same  songs  they 
warbled  on  creation  morn.  It  is  no  care  of 
theirs  to  mingle  melody  with  horrid  sounds ;  to 
weld  their  notes  into  a  dagger  of  discord 
wherewith  to  stab  men  through  the  ear.  They 
do  not  strive  to  produce  those  damnable  grat- 
ings, shriekings  and  rumblings  which  so  often 


ORIGINALITY  49 

pass  for  music  in  these  days.  Where,  Sir,  is  the 
originality  of  the  nightingale,  or  of  the  mock- 
ing-bird ?  Sir,  all  music  may  be  noise,  but  that 
all  noise  is  music  I  do  deny  with  all  my  heart. 
That  a  noise  is  new  does  not  recommend  it  to 
my  ear. 

Sir,  I  lay  it  down  as  a  proposition  not  to  be 
refuted,  that  a  good  imitation  is  better  than  a 
poor  original,  and  while  many  men  may  create 
passable  imitations,  very  few  can  produce  any- 
thing which  is  both  original  and  good.  I  do  not 
hold  it  against  an  author  that  he  is  not  wholly 
original.  On  the  contrary,  if  he  imitate  good 
models,  I  regard  his  imitation  as  an  evidence  of 
sound  sense.  And,  what  is  more,  Sir,  I  believe 
that  most  people  are  no  more  enamored  of 
originality  than  I  am. 

Here  is  a  secret,  Mr.  Idler,  known  to  only  a 
few:  We  never  grow  tired  of  the  things  we 
really  like,  but  only  of  the  things  which  have 
appealed  to  us  momentarily  because  of  their 
novelty.  When  we  really  like  an  author,  we 
like  another  author  who  is  like  him.  When  we 
really  like  a  melody,  we  like  another  melody 


50  NEW   BROOMS 

which  is  like  it.  When  we  really  like  a  place, 
we  have  no  desire  to  leave  it.  Early  in  life  we 
form  attachments  for  certain  things — our 
homes,  our  parents,  Mother  Goose  and  the  like. 
This  fondness  we  never  entirely  outgrow.  We 
like  the  books  we  used  to  like,  the  pictures,  the 
songs  and  the  places.  I  am  speaking  now,  Sir, 
of  normal  human  beings.  There  are  some,  ever 
seeking  new  things,  who  never  learn  to  like 
anything.  To  them,  old  books  are  wearisome, 
old  pictures  are  uninteresting,  old  tunes  in- 
sipid. To  them,  all  places  are  places  to  go  from 
or  go  to,  but  never  to  stay  in.  For  them,  the 
past  is  closed  and  history  is  out  of  date. 

"Beware  of  imitations!"  say  the  advertise- 
ments. "Beware  of  originality!"  say  I.  If  we 
were  all  original,  there  would  be  no  living  with 
us.  The  original  genius  is  well  enough  when 
we  wish  to  be  entertained,  but  it  is  the  old- 
fashioned  reliable  imitator  who  makes  this 
world  the  pleasant  place  it  is.  And  let  us  not 
forget,  Sir,  that  the  most  original  thing  in  the 
world  is  sin.  I  am,  Sir, 

DAVID  DUPLEX. 


A  FLATTERING  TRIBUTE 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  Some  months  ago  I  read  in  your 
magazine  an  article  in  which  you  advocated  the 
keeping  of  a  journal  or  diary,  saying  that  by 
this  means  one  might  always  keep  one's  self 
well  informed  as  to  what  progress  one  might 
be  making  spiritually,  morally  and  mentally 
upon  the  journey  through  life.  This  suggestion 
struck  me  very  forcibly;  so  much  so,  indeed, 
that  I  straightway  determined  to  act  upon  your 
advice  and  to  begin  forthwith  such  a  record  of 
my  intimate  life  as  would  enable  me,  at  any 
time  when  the  spirit  moved  me,  to  inform  my- 
self in  this  respect.  Up  to  the  time  when  I 
read  the  article  of  which  I  speak,  I  had  always 
considered  the  writing  of  a  diary  as  rather  a 
senseless  occupation,  since  I  could  not  see  why 
one  need  put  down  that  which  was  already  well 
known  to  one's  self ;  but  when  I  had  read  your 
advice  upon  the  subject,  I  soon  came  to  see  that 

51 


52  NEW   BROOMS 

there  is  much  which  will  inevitably  escape,  not 
only  the  memory,  but  the  attention  as  well,  un- 
less committed  to  paper. 

Convinced,  then,  of  the  usefulness  of  such 
an  intimate  record,  I  set  myself  to  writing 
down  with  great  particularity  all  that  I  saw, 
heard,  said,  did  or  read;  so  that  I  may  now 
look  back  at  the  end  of  the  year  and  review 
each  day  in  all  its  details.  As  you  may  suppose, 
I  was  much  surprised  to  find  myself  given  to 
habits  of  which  I  had  formerly  been  quite  un- 
aware. I  discovered  that  much  of  my  reading, 
for  instance,  was  of  a  decidedly  frivolous  and 
unprofitable  sort.  After  considering  this  for 
some  time,  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
it  is  time  for  me  to  mend  my  ways  and  to  aban- 
don my  habit  of  indiscriminate  and  idle  read- 
ing, and  I  therefore  request  that  you  will  can- 
cel my  subscription  to  The  Idler. 

Thanking  you  for  the  article  on  diaries, 
which  will,  I  am  sure,  prove  a  most  valuable 
suggestion  to  me,  I  am,  Sir, 
Truly  yours, 

LUCY  LACKWIT. 


THE  RIDDLE  OF  A  DREAM 

"Set  a  beggar  on  horseback  and  he  will  ride 
a  gallop."  — Shakespeare. 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  have  had  a  curious  dream  and 
I  am  at  a  loss  to  account  for  it.  I  have  con- 
sulted an  old  dream  book,  which  I  have  in  my 
possession,  and  which  was  formerly  the  prop- 
erty of  my  old  nurse,  Aunt  Betty  S.,  but  for 
all  my  diligent  searching  therein,  I  have  failed 
utterly  to  find  anything  which  might  serve  as 
an  interpretation  of  my  vision.  I  called  at  the 
public  library  of  our  village  and  asked  for  the 
latest  and  most  up-to-date  work  of  this  char- 
acter, but  the  librarian  only  laughed  at  my  re- 
quest and  assured  me  that  she  possessed  no  such 
work  and  that  as  far  as  she  knew  there  had 
never  been  any  such  work  upon  her  shelves.  To 
my  protest  that  no  library  could  be  complete 

53 


54  NEW   BROOMS 

without  at  least  a  few  volumes  of  this  charac- 
ter, she  retorted  that  only  fools  and  old  fogies 
any  longer  had  any  faith  in  the  meaning  of 
dreams,  and  that  if  I  was  troubled  with  night- 
mare the  best  thing  I  could  do  would  be  to  stop 
lying  on  my  back  or  be  more  careful  of  what 
I  ate  before  going  to  bed. 

It  would  seem  that  I  am  a  bit  old-fashioned 
in  my  faith  in  the  meaning  of  dreams,  though 
I  do  not  see  how  any  one  who  pretends  to  a  be- 
lief in  the  Christian  faith  can  scoff  at  the  in- 
terpretation and  significance  of  them  in  the 
face  of  the  many  notable  instances  cited  in  the 
Bible,  as,  for  example,  the  vision  of  Jacob  and 
the  dream  which  caused  Joseph  to  flee  into 
Egypt.  I  suppose,  however,  that  I  should  not 
be  surprised  at  the  light  and  irreverent  fashion 
in  which  the  young  people  of  to-day  treat  this 
subject,  when  I  reflect  that  a  Christian  clergy- 
man has  recently  suggested  a  revision  of  the 
Ten  Commandments.  Notwithstanding  the 
apparently  widespread  heresy  concerning  the 
futility  and  emptiness  of  dreams,  I  trust  that 
I  am  not  the  only  Christian  gentleman  now 


living  who  clings  to  the  faith  of  his  fathers 
and  who  has  sufficient  faith  in  the  inspiration 
of  the  Gospels  to  believe  that  a  dream  is  some- 
thing more  than  a  result  of  injudicious  eating. 
It  is  in  the  hope  that  some  such  person  may  be 
a  reader  of  your  journal  and  that  the  result 
may  be  a  correct  interpretation  of  my  own 
dream,  that  I  am  writing  this  to  you.  I  ob- 
serve that  your  journal  is  somewhat  behind  the 
times  in  many  respects  and  therefore  I  assume 
that  some  of  your  readers  are  likely  to  be  as 
old-fashioned  and  as  "superstitious"  as  myself. 
The  dream  which  I  am  about  to  relate  came 
to  me  in  the  following  circumstances.  I  had 
been  out  rather  late  the  night  before  and  had 
partaken  of  a  number  of  fancy  dishes  such  as 
I  am  not  in  the  habit  of  eating  at  my  own 
table,  but  which  my  daughter,  who  is  just  back 
from  a  young  ladies'  finishing  school,  assures 
me  are  much  more  pleasing  if  not  more  nour- 
ishing than  the  ham  and  eggs  which  I  was  upon 
the  point  of  ordering  for  our  supper  after  the 
theater.  It  was  in  the  morning  of  the  next  day 
and  we  were  out  in  our  new  automobile  which 


56  NEW   BROOMS 

had  only  come  from  the  factory  the  day  be- 
fore. The  automobile,  or  "car"  as  my  daughter 
calls  it,  is  of  rather  expensive  make  and  luxuri- 
ous to  a  degree.  Being  somewhat  fagged  by 
my  unaccustomed  dissipation  of  the  night  be- 
fore, I  leaned  back  upon  the  cushions  and  pres- 
ently I  fell  asleep. 

It  appeared  to  me  that  I  was  no  longer  in 
the  automobile,  but  trudging  along  the  road  as 
I  was  in  the  habit  of  doing  in  my  younger 
years.  As  I  came  to  a  turn  in  the  road  I  was 
confronted  with  a  troop  of  horsemen,  who 
were  by  all  odds  the  strangest  company  it  has 
ever  been  my  lot  to  behold.  All  of  them  were 
splendidly  mounted  on  magnificent  horses 
which  were  caparisoned  like  the  mounts  of  the 
knights  in  some  rich  and  gorgeous  medieval 
tapestry.  Their  bridles  were  of  chased  leather 
with  bits  and  buckles  of  solid  gold;  their  stir- 
rups were  of  platinum  and  silver,  and  their 
saddles  were  of  silver  and  gold,  upholstered  in 
plush  and  velvet.  Silk  and  satin  ribbons  floated 
from  the  bridles  of  the  horses  and  flaunted  in 
the  wind  in  gay  and  beautiful  streamers.  But 


THE   RIDDLE   OF  A  DREAM    57 

with  the  horses  and  their  trappings  the  mag- 
nificence came  to  a  sudden  end.  The  riders 
themselves  were  the  most  incongruous  riders 
for  such  noble  animals  that  one  could  imagine. 
They  were,  without  exception,  tattered  and  be- 
draggled to  the  last  degree  of  unkempt  f  rowsi- 
ness.  Their  faces  were  gaunt  and  drawn  as 
with  hunger  and  their  hair  hung  unbrushed 
and  uncombed  upon  their  frayed  collars.  In 
more  than  one  instance  a  foot  was  thrust 
through  a  silver  stirrup  while  the  toes  of  the 
rider  came  peeping  through  the  broken  ends  of 
his  boot.  A  more  wretched  company  mounted 
upon  more  beautiful  chargers  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  imagine. 

At  sight  of  me  the  whole  company  came 
to  a  sudden  halt,  checking  their  mounts  as  at 
the  command  of  a  leader,  though  no  word  was 
spoken.  The  leader  of  the  cavalcade,  who  be- 
strode a  handsome  gelding,  rode  out  a  little  in 
advance  of  his  fellows,  and  removing  his 
crownless  hat,  swept  me  a  bow,  leaning  low 
over  the  pommel  of  his  saddle.  And  when  I 
had  returned  his  salutation,  he  addressed  me  in 


58  NEW   BROOMS 

these  words :  "I  give  you  good  morrow,  gentle 
sir,  and  I  beg  you  in  the  name  of  Christ  and 
this  our  company  that  you  spare  us  a  few  coins 
of  silver  or  of  gold  that  we  may  partake  of 
food  and  drink,  for  the  way  is  long  and  weary 
and  we  can  not  travel  without  meat  and  wine  to 
sustain  us  on  our  journey." 

Now  this  speech  greatly  astonished  me,  as  I 
had  never  seen  so  large  a  company  of  beggars 
journeying  together,  and  I  was  the  more  as- 
tounded that  men  mounted  in  such  splendid 
fashion  should  be  asking  alms. 

"What!"  I  cried  in  amazement,  "are  you 
begging  then,  while  you  ride  upon  such  fine 
horses,  and  your  bridles  and  saddles  are  worth 
a  king's  ransom?" 

"Even  so,"  replied  the  leader,  "and  much  as 
I  loathe  discourtesy,  I  must  remind  you  that 
our  time  is  short,  so  pray  give  us  what  funds 
you  can  spare  and  let  us  be  on  our  way,  for  we 
hope  to  reach  our  destination  by  nightfall." 

"And  what  is  your  destination?"  I  asked. 

"The  City  of  Vain  Display,"  he  replied. 
"But  we  dally." 


THE   RIDDLE   OF  A  DREAM    59 

"But  if  you  need  money,"  I  protested,  "why 
do  you  not  sell  your  horses  and  trappings?" 

At  this  the  whole  company  cried  out  in  pro- 
test, and  the  leader  answered:  "Sell  our 
mounts?  Never!  Look  at  them.  Are  they  not 
beautiful?" 

And  truly  they  were.  And  as  I  looked  at 
them  I  was  seized  with  a  great  desire  to  feel  a 
horse  of  like  magnificence  between  my  knees, 
and  I  cried,  "I  wish  that  I,  too,  had  a  horse  like 
that!" 

"Give  me  all  the  money  that  you  have,"  said 
the  leader,  "and  you  shall  have  one." 

So  I  gave  him  the  money.  Presently  I 
found  myself  riding  with  them  and  my  clothes 
were  as  tattered  and  torn  as  the  clothes  of  the 
others.  And  we  set  off  at  a  furious  pace,  faster 
and  faster,  until  the  horses  panted  with  exer- 
tion, and  after  a  time  one  stumbled  and  fell, 
sending  his  rider  over  his  head  to  the  hard 
road.  But  nobody  stopped,  and  looking  back, 
I  saw  the  unfortunate  fellow  sprawling  in  the 
roadway  with  his  neck  broken.  On,  on  we 
went,  one  horse  after  another  giving  a  final 


60  NEW    BROOMS 

gasp  and  falling  down  in  the  road,  and  as  each 
one  fell  we  who  were  left  urged  our  mounts  to 
greater  exertions,  plying  whip  and  spur  with- 
out ceasing,  until  finally  only  the  leader  and  I 
were  riding  on.  Then  his  horse  stumbled 
to  its  knees  and  rolled  over  on  its  side,  and  I 
rode  on  alone.  Lashing  my  horse  I  strained 
onward  till  the  poor  heast  came  crashing  down 
with  a  jar  that  threw  me  headlong  upon  the 
highway,  where  I  fell  so  heavily  that  I  woke. 

I  have  pondered  over  this  dream  ever  since, 
but  I  confess  I  can  make  nothing  of  it.  I 
must  draw  this  letter  to  a  close  now,  for  my 
daughter  informs  me  that  the  automobile  is 
waiting,  and  I  have  not  mortgaged  my  house 
to  secure  the  thing  for  the  purpose  of  letting  it 
stand  idle. 

I  hope,  Sir,  that  if  you  or  any  of  your  read- 
ers can  read  me  the  riddle  of  this  dream  they 
will  be  good  enough  to  forward  the  solution  to 
Your  humble  servant, 

TIMOTHY  TINSELTOP. 

BLUFFTOWN,  NEW  YORK. 


BEDS  FOR  THE  BAD 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  It  was  Sancho  Panza,  if  my 
memory  serves  me  right,  who  invoked  a  bless- 
ing upon  the  head  of  the  man  who  first  in- 
vented sleep;  I  think  he  had  done  better  to 
bestow  his  blessings  upon  the  man  who  first 
invented  beds.  I  think  it  extremely  doubtful 
if  sleep  can  be  classed  as  an  invention  of 
man;  it  is,  rather,  a  function,  like  breathing, 
and  I  doubt  not  that  Adam  fell  a-nodding 
before  ever  he  knew  the  meaning  of  sleep  at 
all.  The  bed,  upon  the  contrary,  is  without 
question  of  human  origin,  for  no  other  living 
thing  has  constructed  anything  resembling  it 
except  the  bird,  who  makes  his  nest  serve  him 
as  both  bed  and  house,  and  certainly  no  deity 
could  have  occasion  to  use  such  an  article,  see- 
ing that  eternal  wake  fulness  is  a  necessary  at- 
tribute of  godhood. 

61 


62  NEW   BROOMS 

The  bed,  in  my  opinion,  is  the  greatest  of  all 
human  inventions,  without  which  sleep  were 
robbed  of  half  its  pleasure.  Nowhere  do  we 
enjoy  such  delicious  refreshing  repose  as  when 
snugly  ensconced  in  a  proper  bed,  and  for  my 
part,  there  is  no  other  luxury  which  I  could  not 
spare  better  than  my  bed.  Napkins,  table- 
cloths, knives,  forks,  spoons — even  the  table,  I 
could  forego  without  great  loss  of  appetite, 
but  I  can  rest  nowhere  else  than  in  a  bed,  and 
I  can  rest  well  in  no  bed  but  my  own.  So 
strong  is  my  regard  for  this  article  of  house- 
hold furniture,  that,  were  I  a  poet,  I  should 
ask  no  greater  glory  than  to  be  the  author  of 
those  beautiful  lines  of  Thomas  Hood — 

"Obed!  O  bed '.delicious  bed! 
That  heaven  upon  earth  to  the  weary  head !" 

No  truer  words  were  ever  spoken  than  those 
of  Isaac  De  Benserade  when  he  said: 

"In  bed  we  laugh,  in  bed  we  cry, 
And,  born  in  bed,  in  bed  we  die; 
The  near  approach  a  bed  may  show 
Of  human  bliss  to  human  woe." 


BEDS    FOR    THE    BAD  63 

A  man  may  be  without  land  or  money  and 
still  be  happy;  he  may  endure  the  loss  of 
friends  and  fortune,  and  he  may  preserve  his 
courage  even  in  the  face  of  shame  and  dis- 
grace ;  but,  Sir,  a  man  who  has  not  a  good  bed 
is  no  more  than  half  a  man.  Without  this 
refuge  from  the  trials  and  troubles  of  the 
world,  a  man  is  robbed  of  the  one  consolation 
which  it  should  be  the  right  of  every  man  to 
enjoy.  Without  a  bed,  his  vitality  is  sapped, 
his  courage  is  broken  down  and  his  moral  sense 
is  impaired.  I  maintain,  Sir,  that  no  man  can 
go  bedless  without  becoming  a  menace  to  the 
community,  and  this  brings  me  to  the  subject 
I  had  in  mind  when  I  sat  down  to  write  this 
letter. 

I  have  observed,  Mr.  Idler,  that  though  a 
great  many  people  of  excellent  intentions  de- 
vote themselves  to  the  task  of  reforming  and 
reclaiming  members  of  the  criminal  class,  the 
result  of  their  labors  is  very  far  from  being 
satisfactory.  In  spite  of  the  great  number  of 
reformatories,  prisons  and  houses  of  refuge 
erected  in  all  parts  of  the  world;  in  spite  of 


64  NEW    BROOMS 

numberless  soup  kitchens,  missions,  free  sana- 
toriums  and  the  like,  men  continue  to  break  the 
laws  and  all  our  efforts  to  eradicate  crime  ap- 
pear to  go  for  little  or  nothing.  Now  I  am  con- 
vinced that  there  is  a  very  good  reason  why  this 
is  true,  and  it  is  my  conviction  that  our  failure 
to  abolish  crime  is  directly  due  to  our  stupidity 
and  block -headedness  in  attacking  the  prob- 
lem from  the  wrong  angle.  Instead  of  trying 
to  reform  our  criminals  by  the  fear  of  punish- 
ment, we  should  prevent  crime  by  diverting 
their  minds  from  evil-doing  and  direct  them 
into  proper  paths  by  the  simple  expedient 
which  I  am  about  to  lay  before  you. 

There  is  nothing  in  the  world  which  is  more 
likely  to  put  a  man  into  a  good  humor  with 
himself,  with  other  men  and  with  existing  con- 
ditions, than  a  good  night's  rest.  As  I  have 
said  before,  every  man  who  lacks  a  bed  is  a  po- 
tential criminal  and  there  are  a  number  of  rea- 
sons why  this  is  so.  To  lack  repose  naturally 
wears  upon  the  nerves  and  reduces  a  man  to  a 
condition  bordering  upon  insanity.  It  is  con- 
ducive to  cynicism,  self-pity,  a  feeling  of  re- 


BEDS    FOR    THE    BAD  65 

sentment  against  all  other  men  and  a  strong 
sense  of  injustice.  No  matter  what  the  cause 
of  his  bedless  condition  may  be,  no  man  can 
preserve  an  even  temper  when  he  wants  to  go 
to  bed  and  has  no  bed  to  which  he  may  go. 
Again,  being  out  of  bed  and  out  of  temper, 
he  is  ripe  for  various  sorts  of  evil  deeds  from 
which  he  would  turn  in  loathing  after  a  good 
night's  rest.  He  is  driven  for  shelter  and  di- 
vertisement  into  the  haunts  of  vice  and  the 
dens  of  iniquity.  He  beguiles  his  sleepless 
hours  in  the  company  of  vicious  and  dissolute 
persons.  He  regards  the  world  from  an  en- 
tirely different  point  of  view  from  the  man  who 
has  just  passed  seven  or  eight  pleasant  hours 
in  restful  slumber.  Sleeplessness  and  crime  are 
as  closely  related  as  insomnia  and  insanity. 
Crime  leads  to  sleeplessness  and  sleeplessness 
leads  to  crime. 

Now,  Sir,  what  I  propose  is  just  this:  let  us 
put  the  criminals  to  bed.  Instead  of  offering 
the  outcast  a  cold  plate  of  soup  or  an  inane 
tract,  let  us  offer  him  a  warm  comfortable  bed 
where  he  may  lie  down  and  pass  at  least  eight 


66  NEW    BROOMS 

hours  of  the  twenty- four  in  dreaming  that  he 
is  John  D.  Rockefeller  or  some  other  such 
harmless  illusion.  Let  us  offer  him  an  oppor- 
tunity to  recover  his  strength,  his  courage  and 
his  moral  balance  in  innocent  sleep.  I  do  not 
believe  that  the  perfect  social  state  can  ever  be 
brought  about  until  such  time  as  every  person 
in  the  world  shall  own  his  own  bed ;  until  such 
time  as  beds  shall  be  assigned  by  law  to  all 
those  who  can  not  purchase  them  upon  their 
own  account;  until  such  time  as  a  man's  bed 
shall  be  sacred  to  his  own  use,  exempt  from 
taxation  or  seizure  by  writ  or  other  legal 
process  and  as  inviolate  as  the  clothes  upon  his 
back.  I  do  not  believe  a  perfect  social  state  will 
ever  be  attained  until  it  shall  be  a  crime  for  a 
chambermaid  to  make  a  bed  improperly  or  for 
a  merchant  to  sell  an  imperfect  spring  or  a 
lumpy  mattress.  I  do  not  believe  a  perfect  so- 
cial state  can  ever  be  reached  until  every  man 
in  the  world,  and  every  woman  and  child,  is 
guaranteed  a  good  night's  rest  every  night  in 
the  year. 

But  as  we  have  not  yet  advanced  to  a  state 


BEDS    FOR    THE    BAD  67 

of  civilization  where  it  would  be  practicable  to 
provide  every  human  being  with  a  personal  bed 
of  his  own,  let  us  do  what  we  can.  Do  you  be- 
lieve, Sir,  that  any  but  the  most  callow  of 
youthful  roisterers  prefer  the  disgusting  at- 
mosphere of  the  all-night  saloon  or  the  bleak 
cheerlessness  of  a  park  bench  to  the  heavenly 
comforts  of  a  good  bed?  If  you  do,  Sir,  you 
are  vastly  mistaken.  Throw  open  to  these  men 
an  absolutely  free  lodging-house  filled  with 
clean  comfortable  beds,  where  all  may  come 
and  go  unquestioned  as  long  as  they  enter  at  a 
certain  hour  and  remain  a  stipulated  time,  and 
I  warrant  you  that  lodging-house  will  be  filled 
to  its  capacity  every  night  in  the  year.  Let 
every  community  erect  as  many  of  these  lodg- 
ing-houses as  its  financial  condition  will  per- 
mit. Let  the  vast  sums  that  are  now  being 
wasted  upon  futile  missions  and  piffling  soup- 
kitchens  be  diverted  to  this  legitimate  end. 
Once  we  have  our  criminals  and  our  outcasts  in 
bed,  we  shall  have  them  out  of  the  streets,  out 
of  the  parks,  out  of  the  gambling  hells,  out  of 
the  brothels  and  out  of  mischief! 


68  NEW   BROOMS 

The  state  plays  the  father  in  chastising  dis- 
obedient citizens;  let  the  state  also  play  the 
mother  in  tucking  them  into  bed.  Go  look 
upon  them  when  every  face  is  wiped  clean  of 
frown  and  leer;  go  look  upon  them  when  every 
face  is  smooth  and  quiet  as  the  resting  soul 
within 

"And  on  their  lids 
The  baby  Sleep  is  pillowed    .    .    ." 

and  I  warrant  you,  you  shall  find  them,  not 
outcasts  and  outlaws,  but  poor  tired  children 
whom  you  can  not  forbear  to  wish,  as  I  now 
wish  you, 

Good  night,  and  happy  dreams ! 

CADWALLADER  COVERLET. 


IS  CHESTERTON  A  MAN  ALIVE? 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  If  I  were  a  writer  of  biograph- 
ical sketches,  I  should  begin  these  remarks 
with  the  statement  that  Gilbert  Keith  Chester- 
ton was  born  in  the  year  1874;  but  I  am  not  a 
writer  of  biographical  sketches.  On  the  con- 
trary, Sir,  I  am  one  who  aims  to  tell  the  truth 
as  often  as  it  is  possible  to  tell  the  truth  with- 
out appearing  eccentric.  I  do  not  begin  these 
remarks  in  the  fashion  I  have  suggested  be- 
cause I  am  restrained  by  scruples  which  would 
never  trouble  a  writer  of  biographies.  The  fact 
of  the  matter  is,  I  do  not  know  that  Gilbert 
Keith  Chesterton  was  born  in  1874.  I  do  not 
know  that  he  was  ever  born  at  all — at  most  I 
only  suspect  it.  I  suspect  it  because  I  never 
knew  a  man  who  had  never  been  born  to  attract 
so  much  attention.  His  books  may  be  urged  as 
evidence  of  his  birth,  but  they  are  by  no  means 

69 


70  NEW   BROOMS 

conclusive  evidence.  So  far  as  my  personal  in- 
formation goes,  he  may  be  nothing  more  than 
a  name,  like  Bertha  M.  Clay.  Perhaps  he  is 
only  a  creature  of  the  imagination,  like  Inno- 
cent Smith,  created  by  some  author  who  chooses 
to  write  under  the  name,  "Gilbert  Chesterton." 
I  do  not  suggest  these  things  as  probabilities, 
but  only  as  possibilities.  And  yet,  what  could 
be  more  improbable  than  Chesterton  himself? 
Is  it  not,  after  all,  more  probable  that  he  has 
been  evolved  from  pen  and  ink,  than  from  the 
clay  of  Adam? 

We  come  now  to  the  question  which  I  bor- 
row from  the  title  of  this  paper:  Is  Gilbert 
Keith  Chesterton  a  man  alive?  Is  he  not, 
rather,  a  very  amusing  conception  of  what  a 
man  might  be  ?  Let  us  consider  the  matter. 

Of  course  the  fact  that  you  and  I  have  no 
positive  proof  of  his  having  been  born  does 
not  argue  that  he  is  not  a  living  man.  Every 
day  we  meet  men  who  are  unquestionably  as 
real  as  ourselves  (providing  we  do  not  lean  to 
the  theory  of  Bishop  Berkeley,  that  we  can  be 
sure  of  no  existence  but  our  own) ,  yet  we  know 


IS    CHESTERTON    ALIVE?       71 

little  or  nothing  of  the  origin  of  these  men. 
They  may  have  been  born,  or  they  may  not.  If 
you  were  to  ask  them,  they  would  probably  in- 
sist that  they  were  born  at  one  time  or  another. 
They  believe  this  because  they  can  not  account 
for  their  existence  upon  any  other  hypothesis. 
But  they  believe  it  on  hearsay  evidence.  Not 
one  of  them  really  remembers  anything  at  all 
about  it.  People  sometimes  grow  up  to  learn 
that  they  are  changelings ;  that  they  are  not  at 
all  the  people  they  had  thought  they  were.  Is 
it  not  possible,  then,  that  here  and  there  may 
live  a  man  who  was  never  born  at  all  ?  I  should 
not  be  so  bold  as  to  deny  the  possibility.  There 
have  always  been  legends  of  men  who  can  not 
die — men  who  live  on  in  spite  of  age  and  acci- 
dent. I  see  no  reason  why  one  man  should  not 
escape  birth  if  another  may  escape  death.  I  do 
not,  therefore,  insist  that  Mr.  Chesterton  prove 
himself  to  have  been  born.  It  is  only  that  I  find 
it  hard  to  believe  that  he  really  exists  in  the 
flesh. 

Now,  Mr.  Chesterton,  in  all  his  works,  dwells 
upon  the  subject  of  madness  or  insanity.  Does 


72  NEW    BROOMS 

this  prove  that  Mr.  Chesterton  is  mad  ?  By  no 
means.  As  he  himself  has  said,  the  man  who  is 
really  mad  seldom  suspects  that  he  is  unbal- 
anced; it  is  the  man  who  fears  madness  who 
finds  madness  a  fascinating  subject.  Sir,  Mr. 
Chesterton  is  not  mad,  but  I  think  he  fears 
madness.  It  is  almost  impossible  to  find  one  of 
his  essays  in  which  there  is  no  mention  of  mad- 
ness. I  think  it  fair  to  assume  that  he  writes  of 
madness  because  he  has  a  fear — not  necessarily 
a  terror,  you  understand,  but  still  a  fear — that 
some  day  he  may  be  afflicted  with  this  malady. 
Mr.  Chesterton  also  writes  a  whole  book  upon 
the  subject  of  being  alive.  Are  we  to  assume, 
because  of  this,  that  he  is  alive?  By  no  means. 
It  is  quite  possible  that  he  only  fears  he  may 
some  day  come  alive;  that  he  may  some  day 
cease  to  be  the  whimsical  creation  of  some  au- 
thor's fancy  and  become  a  real  man  of  flesh  and 
blood. 

Do  you  see  no  reason  why  he  should  fear 
such  a  metamorphosis?  Surely  you  must. 
From  time  immemorial,  men  have  shuddered 
at  the  thought  of  becoming  a  spirit,  an  infinite 


IS    CHESTERTON    ALIVE?       73 

being  composed  chiefly  of  memory;  a  purely 
intellectual  organism  having  nothing  material 
in  its  make-up.  Now  if  men  are  disturbed,  as 
they  are,  at  the  prospect  of  becoming  ideas, 
why  should  not  ideas  be  disturbed  at  the  pros- 
pect of  becoming  men?  Is  it  likely  that  an  idea, 
immune  from  all  the  evils  of  mortal  existence, 
superior  to  the  weaknesses  of  the  flesh  and 
possessing,  at  least,  a  potential  immortality, 
would  be  pleased  with  the  prospect  of  becom- 
ing mere  man?  Would  an  idea  willingly  aban- 
don the  clear  atmosphere  of  a  purely  intel- 
lectual plane  for  the  muggy  mists  and  murky 
fogs  of  London?  Assuredly  not. 

Lucretius,  ridiculing  the  theory  of  reincar- 
nation in  his  work,  De  Rerum  Natura,  drew  a 
ludicrous  picture  of  disembodied  spirits  ea- 
gerly awaiting  their  turn  to  enter  a  vacant 
human  tenement.  Lucretius  was  thoroughly 
appreciative  of  the  absurdity  of  his  picture. 
He  knew  that  no  disembodied  spirit  would  be 
so  foolish  as  to  desire  imprisonment  in  a  mortal 
frame.  And  as  it  is  with  spirits,  so  we  may 
suppose  it  to  be  with  ideas.  It  is  one  thing  to 


74  NEW    BROOMS 

be  put  into  a  book ;  it  is  quite  another  to  be  put 
into  a  body.  No  matter  how  often  an  idea  may 
be  put  into  a  book,  it  can  not  be  confined  there- 
in. It  is  still  free  to  travel  where  it  lists.  It 
can  leap  from  London  to  Overroads  in  the 
twinkling  of  an  eye — or  it  can  be  in  both  places 
at  one  and  the  same  time.  It  may  appear  to  a 
dozen  different  men  in  a  dozen  different  as- 
pects. It  possesses  the  Protean  faculty  of  be- 
ing all  things  to  all  men.  But  confine  that  idea 
in  a  human  body;  transform  that  iclea  into  a 
human  being — and  what  is  the  result?  Why, 
the  result  is  an  immediate  loss  of  liberty.  The 
man,  who  was  formerly  an  idea,  can  no  longer 
flit  about  with  lightning-like  rapidity.  If  he 
wishes  to  travel  from  Overroads  to  London,  he 
must  go  by  train  or  motor-car.  He  can  by  no 
ingenuity  contrive  to  be  in  both  places  at  the 
same  time.  He  must  wear  the  same  face  wher- 
ever or  in  whatever  company  he  may  be. 
Whether  the  body  which  he  inhabits  is  known 
to  its  neighbors  as  Smith  or  Chesterton,  the 
result  is  the  same — he  has  lost  his  liberty.  And 
what  has  he  gained?  He  has  gained  the  ability 


IS    CHESTERTON   ALIVE?      75 

to  prove  his  mortal  existence — the  right  to  say 
that  he  has  been  born. 

It  is  easy  enough  to  see  why  an  idea  should 
fear  to  become  a  man.  And  when  we  consider 
such  an  idea  as  Chesterton,  the  matter  is  even 
clearer.  Whimsicalities  and  contradictions 
which  may  have  been  useful  and  even  orna- 
mental in  the  fictitious  Chesterton — in  Chester- 
ton the  idea — might,  Sir,  prove  most  embar- 
rassing to  Chesterton  the  British  Subject.  You 
can  not  prosecute  an  idea  for  treason,  nor  sue 
it  for  damages.  You  can  not  even  confine  an 
idea  in  a  mad-house  for  being  crazy.  Most 
ideas  are  crazy ;  none  more  so  perhaps  than  the 
one  which  I  am  presenting  to  you  now.  It  is 
true  that  a  few  ideas  have  been  confined  in  a 
mad-house,  but  of  those  few  which  have  been 
shut  up  with  the  persons  claiming  them,  the 
great  majority  have  been  quite  sane.  Just  as 
many  sane  men  are  devoted  to  crazy  ideas,  so 
many  sane  ideas  are  devoted  to  crazy  men;  so 
devoted  to  them  that  they  will  follow  them  any- 
where— even  to  a  mad-house. 

If  my  idea  that  Mr.  Chesterton  is  an  idea  is 


76  NEW   BROOMS 

correct,  I  am  sure  I  do  not  know  whose  idea  he 
may  be;  but  he  is  just  such  a  crazy  idea  as 
might  belong  to  a  sane  man  and  should  there- 
fore be  safe  in  sticking  to  his  originator.  If 
Mr.  Chesterton  is  an  idea  and  is  thinking  of 
becoming  a  man,  I  should  strongly  advise  him 
against  adopting  any  such  course.  I  like  him 
much  better  as  an  idea.  He  is  so  much  more 
plausible  that  way. 

I  am,  Sir, 

A.  VISIONAEY. 


FROM  A  HUNCHBACK 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  had  the  misfortune,  through 
no  fault  of  my  own,  to  be  born  a  hunchback. 
This,  in  itself,  Sir,  is  an  affliction  suffi- 
cient to  render  my  life  a  hard  one  and  to  em- 
bitter such  happiness  as  I  may  snatch  from  the 
hands  of  fate ;  but  it  is  an  affliction  for  which, 
as  far  as  I  know,  nobody  is  to  blame,  and  one, 
therefore,  which  I  must  bear  with  such  patience 
and  fortitude  as  I  can  command.  But  I  bear  in 
common  with  other  cripples  a  far  greater  bur- 
den than  mere  physical  disability,  and  that  is 
the  contempt  and  pity  of  my  fellow  men. 

I  find  that  some  men  regard  me  with  con- 
tempt alone,  some  with  contempt  and  pity  in- 
termingled, and  some  with  simple  pity — and 
of  the  three  I  think  the  last  is,  perhaps,  the 
hardest  to  endure  with  equanimity,  since  it  is 
the  most  sincere  feeling  of  superiority  which 

77 


78  NEW   BROOMS 

prompts  it.  I  do  not  ask  the  pity  of  my  fel- 
lows; I  consider  myself  in  much  better  case 
than  many  men  who  have  straight  backs  and 
smooth  shoulders;  and  certainly  I  can  not  see 
why  I  should  deserve  the  contempt  of  any  one 
merely  because  I  happen  to  have  been  born 
with  a  body  unlike  that  of  the  majority  of  men. 
Yet  I  find  the  hump  upon  my  back  a  hindrance 
in  every  venture  that  I  undertake. 

A  few  years  ago  when  I  was  younger  and 
more  sanguine  than  I  am  now,  when  I  still  had 
faith  in  the  innate  fairness  of  human  nature 
and  in  the  spirituality  of  the  love  of  women,  I 
fell  in  love.  Fortunately,  as  I  thought  then,  I 
had  not  come  into  the  world  naked  if  I  had 
come  crooked,  for  I  possessed  a  comfortable 
balance  at  the  bank;  a  sum  of  money  in  point 
of  fact  which  was  far  in  excess  of  the  financial 
resources  of  any  of  the  other  young  men  of  my 
acquaintance.  Counting  upon  the  good  times 
which  my  supply  of  ready  money  seemed  likely 
to  afford  them,  a  number  of  the  more  promi- 
nent young  men  of  my  native  town  had  taken 
the  trouble  to  cultivate  my  society  during  their 


79 

college  days  when  they  were  often  short  of 
money  and  found  it  convenient  to  have  a  friend 
who  could  always  be  relied  on  to  help  out  in 
a  pinch  and  who  was  not  at  all  inclined  to  play 
the  dun  if  payments  were  somewhat  slow. 
Having,  as  I  say,  availed  themselves  of  my 
generosity  and  cultivated  my  company  in  those 
lean  years  of  study,  these  young  men,  upon  en- 
tering into  the  world  of  business  and  society, 
could  not,  with  a  good  grace,  begin  to  ignore 
me  altogether,  and  they  therefore  made  it  a 
point  to  look  me  up  now  and  then  and  to  invite 
me  about  with  them  to  such  functions  and  en- 
tertainments as  I  might  enjoy,  and  at  the  same 
time,  enter  into  unhandicapped  by  my  physical 
deformity. 

I  could  not,  of  course,  play  tennis,  golf 
or  any  game  of  that  sort.  I  was,  in  truth, 
deterred  from  entering  into  any  such  sport 
more  by  my  natural  horror  of  appearing  ridic- 
ulous than  by  reason  of  an  actual  lack  of  the 
strength  necessary  to  swing  a  racket  or  handle 
a  club.  The  fact  is,  I  am  not  especially  weak 
physically,  having  always  taken  great  care  of 


80  NEW    BROOMS 

my  health  and  having  practised  with  some  suc- 
cess such  physical  exercises  as  might  be  prac- 
tised in  the  privacy  of  my  own  chambers  or 
such  as  would  not  be  likely  to  excite  comment. 
But  no  matter  how  muscular  a  man  may  be,  he 
can  not  but  appear  absurd  when  he  goes  about 
carrying  a  golf  club  nearly  as  tall  as  himself 
or  rushing  about  a  tennis  net  like  a  lame  camel. 
But  though,  as  I  say,  I  was  not  in  demand 
for  such  games  as  these,  I  did  play  an  excellent 
hand  at  whist,  could  thrum  the  guitar  a  bit, 
play  accompaniments  upon  the  piano,  sing  a 
little  in  a  fairly  good  baritone  voice  and  carry 
on  a  conversation  light  or  heavy  as  the  occa- 
sion seemed  to  require.  Of  course,  I  did  not 
dance,  but  I  often  sat  at  the  piano  and  fur- 
nished music  for  the  others,  thus  making  my- 
self useful  and  at  the  same  time  diplomatically 
avoiding  drawing  notice  to  the  fact  that  I  was 
disqualified  as  a  dancer.  Although  I  always 
had  a  secret  longing  for  theatricals  and 
knew  myself  to  be  possessed  of  histrionic  abil- 
ity in  no  mean  degree,  I  never  joined  our  local 
amateur  dramatic  club.  I  think  perhaps  I 


FROM    A   HUNCHBACK          81 

might  have  done  so  had  not  some  tactless  mem- 
ber of  the  club  once  sent  me  an  invitation  to 
take  part  in  a  performance  of  Richard  the 
Third,  which  so  incensed  me  that  I  never  again 
so  much  as  attended  a  play  given  by  that  or- 
ganization. 

It  was  during  this  time,  when  I  was  almost 
enjoying  life  like  an  ordinary  man,  owing  to 
the  careful  manner  in  which  my  acquaintances 
concealed  their  dislike  and  contempt  for  my 
crooked  back,  that  I  met  and  fell  in  love  with 
a  girl  who  seemed  to  me,  at  the  time,  a  charm- 
ing and  sweet-souled  young  woman.  I  saw  a 
great  deal  of  her,  owing  to  the  fact  that  we 
were  both  of  musical  tastes  and  often  played 
and  sang  together,  and  it  was  not  long  before 
I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  if  I  were  ever  to 
marry  I  might  as  well  be  about  it  then  as  any 
time,  and  especially  since  I  had  the  necessary 
mate  at  hand,  so  to  speak.  To  think  was  to  act 
with  me  in  those  days,  and  I  put  the  matter  to 
her  bluntly  the  very  first  time  I  saw  her  after 
forming  my  resolution  in  this  respect.  You 
may  not  believe  me,  but  I  swear  to  you  that  I 


82  NEW    BROOMS 

am  telling  the  truth  when  I  say  that  I  had 
grown  so  accustomed  to  having  my  friends 
ignore  my  infirmity  that  I  had  quite  forgotten 
to  take  it  into  account  in  the  case  of  the  young 
woman.  In  fact,  I  would  have  considered  it  an 
unjust  aspersion  of  her  character  to  think  her 
capable  of  holding  such  a  thing  against  me,  our 
relations  having  been  always  of  the  most  spir- 
itual. 

You  can  imagine,  then,  the  shock  it  gave 
me  when  I  saw  the  horror  growing  in  her  eyes 
which  I  had  so  often  surprised  in  the  eyes  of 
strangers !  You  can  fancy,  perhaps,  the  physi- 
cal and  mental  anguish  I  suffered  in  that  mo- 
ment when  I  realized  that  even  to  her  I  was  not 
as  other  men — that  she  had  played  with  me  as 
one  might  play  with  a  child,  and  that  she  would 
no  sooner  think  of  becoming  my  wife  than  she 
would  think  of  wedding  with  an  educated 
baboon.  And  yet,  Sir,  within  the  space  of  two 
years  I  saw  that  same  young  woman  stand  at 
the  altar  with  a  senile  and  decrepit  old  roue 
who  had  never  possessed  the  tenth  part  of  my 
own  intellectuality  and  who  had  absolutely 


FROM   A   HUNCHBACK         83 

nothing  to  recommend  him  but  a  fortune, 
somewhat  smaller  than  my  own,  and  a  straight 
back.  I  am  told  that  she  is  not  happy  with  him, 
and  small  wonder,  since  he  is  never  at  home 
save  when  he  is  too  drunk  to  be  elsewhere ;  but 
even  so,  I  doubt  if  she  has  ever  regretted  her 
answer  to  me,  so  strong  is  the  prejudice  of  the 
normal  person  against  all  forms  of  physical 
deformity.  The  fact  that  her  husband  is  more 
crooked  in  his  morals  than  I  am  in  my  back 
would,  I  dare  say,  have  no  weight  whatever 
with  her. 

I  have  heard  people  say  that  women  are 
often  attracted  by  men  of  odd  and  unusual 
personal  appearance  and  that  many  women 
find  an  almost  irresistible  fascination  in  crip- 
ples and  the  like,  but  I  have  never  encountered 
anything  in  my  personal  experience  to  incline 
me  to  this  view.  It  is  an  idea  upon  which  Victor 
Hugo  dilates  in  his  romance,  The  Man  Who 
Laughs,  where  the  duchess  becomes  enamored 
of  a  monster.  But  I  am  of  the  opinion  that 
Hugo  treated  this  matter  more  truthfully  and 
realistically  in  The  Bell  Ringer  of  Notre 


84  NEW    BROOMS 

.Dame,  where  the  white  soul  and  brave  heart  of 
Quasimodo  count  for  nothing  with  Esmerelda 
when  weighed  against  the  physical  attractions 
of  the  philandering  captain,  who  is  a  thor- 
oughly bad  lot.  I  have  heard  it  asserted  that 
Lord  Byron  owed  much  of  his  popularity  with 
the  ladies  to  his  club  foot,  but  this  I  take  to  be 
the  sheerest  nonsense.  The  fascination  which 
Lord  Byron  exercised  upon  the  women  was 
not,  I  am  convinced,  due  to  his  physical  de- 
formity, but  to  what  we  may  call  his  mental 
and  moral  deformity.  And  this,  Sir,  brings  us 
to  the  milk  in  the  cocoanut  and  the  point  of  this 
letter.  I  wish  to  ask  you,  and  to  ask  your  read- 
ers, what  I  have  so  often  asked  myself:  Why 
is  it  that  men  and  women  find  physical  deform- 
ity so  hateful  while  they  so  often  find  mental 
and  moral  deformity  attractive? 

Shakespeare,  learned  in  the  ways  of  human 
nature,  laid  particular  stress  upon  the  physical 
shortcomings  of  Richard  the  Third,  well  know- 
ing that  no  amount  of  mere  wickedness  would 
serve  to  turn  the  audience  against  him  so 
strongly  as  a  hump  upon  his  back.  The  villain 


FROM   A   HUNCHBACK          85 

of  the  play,  if  he  be  handsome  and  brave,  will 
often  oust  the  hero  from  his  rightful  place  in 
the  esteem  of  the  audience,  so  that  presently 
the  pit,  the  galleries  and  the  boxes  are  united 
as  one  man  in  wishing  him  success  in  his  vil- 
lainy, or  at  least  in  wishing  him  immunity  from 
his  well-deserved  punishment.  Instead  of  hiss- 
ing him,  the  spectators  are  moved  to  applaud 
him.  And  for  this  reason  the  playwrights  and 
the  novelists  have,  until  late  years  when  the 
worship  of  virtue  is  no  longer  considered  an 
essential  part  of  art,  caused  the  villain  to  ap- 
pear a  coward  or  burdened  him  with  some 
physical  deformity.  And  the  devil  of  it  all  is, 
Sir,  that  most  of  the  villains  in  real  life  are  like 
the  villains  of  the  stage  who  oust  the  hero. 
Charles  Lamb  once  said  that  it  is  a  mistake  to 
assume  that  all  bullies  are  cowards ;  and  in  my 
opinion  it  is  an  even  greater  mistake  to  assume 
that  a  villain  can  not  be  attractive.  If  villains 
had  no  charm,  villainy  would  soon  cease 
through  want  of  success. 

In  the  case  of  Byron,  since  I  seem  to  have 
chosen  him  for  an  example,  the  women  were 


86  NEW   BROOMS 

attracted  on  the  one  hand  by  his  reputation  as  a 
genius  and  upon  the  other  hand  by  his  reputa- 
tion as  a  rake.  Byron,  though  a  cripple,  was  an 
unusually  handsome  man  of  the  poetic  type, 
and  I  think  we  may  safely  assume  that  the 
aversion  which  may  have  been  created  by  his 
club  foot  was  more  than  offset  by  the  fact  that 
he  was  otherwise  of  pleasing  appearance  and 
was  known  to  be  an  athlete.  Now,  of  course,  it 
would  be  impossible  to  say  whether  more  wom- 
en were  fascinated  by  his  genius  or  by  his  rak- 
ishness,  but  on  a  venture  I  would  be  willing  to 
wager  that  nine  out  of  ten  of  the  women  who 
knew  him  would  rather  have  read  his  love  let- 
ters than  his  poetry.  Genius  is  a  thing  apart 
from  love,  and,  say  what  they  will,  I  believe 
that  the  mistress  of  such  a  man  is  more  like  to 
be  jealous  of  her  lover's  genius  than  proud  of 
it,  and  especially  so  where  she  can  not  flatter 
herself  that  it  has  been  inspired  by  love  of  her. 
She  is  interested  in  a  poem  in  which  she  can 
find  herself,  not  because  it  is  poetry,  but  be- 
cause she  is  in  it.  Therefore  I  incline  to  the  be- 
lief that  Byron's  conquests  were  due  to  his 


FROM   A   HUNCHBACK         87 

reputation  as  a  rake,  rather  than  to  his  reputa- 
tion as  a  poet.  But  given  the  combination  of  a 
poet,  a  rake,  a  handsome  man  and  a  lord,  it 
would  be  unnatural  if  women  did  not  love  him. 

But  Byron's  case  is  not  the  only  one  I  have 
in  mind.  It  is  a  common  thing  for  murderers 
in  jail  to  receive  flowers  and  sentimental  letters 
from  women.  Women,  too,  who  have  never  so 
much  as  set  eyes  upon  them  and  who  know 
them  only  by  the  stories  of  their  crimes  in  the 
newspapers.  The  maddest  of  religious  fanatics 
can  always  count  upon  a  goodly  number  of 
women  as  converts.  The  taint  of  insanity  itself 
seems  to  be  less  repulsive  to  women  than  physi- 
cal deformity.  And  the  men  are  little  better 
than  the  women.  A  man  will  often  knowingly 
wed  with  a  fool  because  she  has  a  pretty  face, 
or  vote  a  rogue  into  office  because  he  thinks  him 
clever.  The  juries  of  men  which  try  women 
murderers  are  ready  to  grow  maudlin  over 
them  if  the  women  happen  to  be  good-looking. 

It  is  a  problem,  Sir,  which  I  can  not  solve, 
turn  and  twist  it  as  I  may.  Sometimes  I  think 
that  we  who  are  deformed  in  body  are  granted 


88  NEW   BROOMS 

the  only  straight  minds  to  be  found  among 
men,  by  way  of  compensation.  And  at  such 
times,  Sir,  I  am  inclined  to  thank  God  that  He 
has  seen  fit  to  put  the  hump  upon  the  back  and 
not  upon  the  mind  or  soul  of 

HAROLD  HISHOULDER. 


FROM  A  HOTEL  SPONGE 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  feel  it  my  duty  to  publicly  ex- 
press my  disapproval  of  the  recent  ruling  of 
certain  hotel  proprietors  of  this  city,  and  to 
publicly  protest  against  their  hasty  and  ill-ad- 
vised agreement  that  hereafter  they  will  dis- 
courage, in  every  way  possible,  the  visits  of 
outsiders  who  make  use  of  their  lobbies  and 
halls. 

I  am  myself  one  of  the  best-known  non-resi- 
dent patrons  of  the  hotels  in  this  city,  or,  in  the 
vulgar  language  of  the  innkeepers  themselves 
— a  hotel  sponge.  That  is  to  say,  I  do  not 
register  at  these  hotels  as  a  guest,  but  I  do 
make  it  a  point  to  drop  into  one  or  two  of 
them  every  afternoon  and  evening,  and  I  think 
I  may  say,  without  undue  egotism,  that  you 
will  seldom  see  a  more  debonair  and  smart- 
looking  man  than  I  appear  upon  these  occa- 

89 


90  NEW   BROOMS 

sions.  I  am,  I  believe,  as  my  tailor  says,  "an 
ornament  to  any  assembly,"  and  my  presence 
in  a  hotel  lobby  or  corridor  is  sufficient  to  stamp 
that  hotel  as  a  proper  place  in  the  minds  of  all 
those  who  are  sufficiently  acquainted  with  the 
hall-marks  of  the  haut  ton  to  recognize  a  gen- 
tleman when  they  see  one. 

I  have  been  a  familiar  figure  about  a  certain 
hotel  on  Thirty-fourth  Street  for  the  last  ten 
years,  and  though  the  tide  of  fashion  which 
once  flowed  through  those  corridors  is  now 
somewhat  diminished,  having  set  in  a  northerly 
direction,  yet  that  hotel  continues  to  hold  its 
own  with  the  visitors  from  out  of  town.  And 
do  you  know  why  this  is  so,  Mr.  Idler?  Do  you 
know  why  it  is  that  this  hostelry  is  still  enabled 
to  present  an  appearance  of  smartness  and  ex- 
clusiveness  ?  I  presume  that  you  do  not,  and  so 
I  shall  tell  you.  It  is  simply  that  I  have  chosen 
to  continue  to  appear  there.  Though  the  social 
leaders  whose  names  are  known  across  the  con- 
tinent desert  the  place  for  the  newer  and  no 
less  pretentious  hotels  farther  up-town,  this 
place,  by  reason  of  my  loyalty,  has  suffered  no 


loss  of  standing.  I,  Sir,  am  to  the  hotels  of 
New  York  what  John  Drew  is  to  the  American 
stage.  I  am  that  rosy- faced,  perfectly 
groomed,  elegant  gentleman  of  leisure  who 
saunters  through  the  halls  and  corridors  at  tea 
time  and  at  dinner  time,  and  who  confirms  the 
out-of-town  guest  in  his  opinion  that  he  has 
selected  as  a  place  to  stop  the  one  hotel  which  is 
the  resort  of  fashion. 

If  it  were  not  for  me  and  for  the  other  mem- 
bers of  my  class,  how  long  do  you  suppose  these 
hotels  could  go  on  charging  the  enormous 
prices  they  now  charge  for  food  and  lodging? 
How  long  do  you  suppose  they  could  induce 
the  thrifty  countryman  to  part  with  such  sums 
of  his  hard-earned  money  if  he  were  not  pro- 
vided with  the  inspiring  spectacle  which  I  pre- 
sent when  arrayed  in  my  full  regalia  ?  Not  one 
month,  Sir.  In  less  than  a  fortnight  the  word 
would  go  forth  to  all  parts  of  the  United 
States  that  these  hotels  had  lost  caste  and  were 
becoming  back  numbers. 

It  is  to  me,  and  to  others  like  me,  that  the 
great  modern  hotels  of  this  city  owe  their 


92 

prosperity;  indeed,  I  might  say,  their  very  ex- 
istence. It  is  we  who  set  the  pace  in  luxury  and 
style.   The  hotels  merely  live  up  to  our  stand- 
ards.  The  manager  of  a  shabby  hotel  can  not 
see  me  walk  into  his  lobby  without  feeling  in- 
stantly ashamed  of  the  poor  accommodations 
he  has  to  offer  me.   The  hotel  managers  were 
so  irked  at  being  put  out  of  countenance  by  the 
obvious  superiority  of  the  casual  hotel  visitor 
that  they  set  out  to  provide  for  him  a  proper 
setting.  Do  you  suppose,  Sir,  that  the  expen- 
sive furniture,  the  music,  the  luxurious  reading 
and  smoking-rooms,  the  glittering  bars  and  the 
comfortable  armchairs  of  the  modern,  up-to- 
date  New  York  hotel  were  necessary  to  obtain 
the  custom  and  patronage  of  the  provincial 
visitors,  or  even  necessary  to  hold  that  patron- 
age? No,  Sir!  But  I  am  necessary  to  hold  the 
business  of  these  people,  and  the  luxuries  are 
necessary  to  hold  me.   All  this  is  so  plain,  so 
perfectly  apparent  to  any  observing  person, 
that  it  seems  almost  incredible  that  these  man- 
agers should   dare   to   risk  our  indignation. 
Drive  us  out,  indeed !  They  will  be  very  lucky 


FROM   A   HOTEL    SPONGE     93 

if  we  do  not  withdraw  altogether  of  our  own 
accord,  after  such  a  gratuitous  insult.  A  strike 
of  waiters,  Sir,  would  not  prove  one-half  so  de- 
moralizing as  a  strike  of  the  atmosphere  crea- 
tors, or,  to  use  the  insulting  term  of  the  hotel 
men,  the  "hotel  sponges." 

Can  you  imagine,  Sir,  trying  to  paint  a  for- 
est scene  without  a  tree  in  sight?  That  task 
would  be  as  easy  as  trying  to  conduct  an  aristo- 
cratic hotel  without  an  aristocrat  in  sight. 
"But,"  you  say,  "you  fellows  are  not  really 
aristocrats — you  are  only  imitation  aristo- 
crats." In  so  saying,  Sir,  you  fall  into  the  same 
error  into  which  these  hotel  men  have  fallen. 
We  are  aristocrats.  We  are  the  ideal  aristo- 
crats, and  let  me  tell  you,  Sir,  we  are  much 
more  convincing  than  those  whom  you  would 
doubtless  call  the  real  aristocrats.  I  have  not 
lived  as  a  man-about-town  for  the  last  ten 
years  without  coming  to  know  these  dyed- 
in-the-wool  aristocrats  of  yours  very  well  in- 
deed. I  assure  you  that  you  would  be  much 
surprised  and  disappointed  should  you  see 
them,  as  I  have  seen  them,  at  our  leading 


94  NEW   BROOMS 

hotels.  They  would  no  more  correspond  to  the 
countryman's  idea  of  an  aristocrat  than  an  In- 
dian Chief  would  fulfil  the  romantic  maiden's 
ideal  of  a  ruler  of  men.  Sir,  where  I  am  ur- 
bane, they  are  ill  at  ease.  Where  I  am  clad  in 
the  very  pink  of  fashion,  they  are  often  dowdy, 
not  to  say  shabby.  Where  I  appear  indifferent 
and  slightly  bored,  they  are  often  irritable, 
easily  upset  and  worried-looking.  Oscar  Wilde 
once  said  that  he  was  very  much  disappointed 
in  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  and  I  can  imagine  that 
his  disappointment  was  not  deeper  than  that 
of  the  rural  visitor  who  happens  to  stumble 
upon  a  member  of  what  is  known  as  our  best 
society. 

Doubtless  you  fancy  that  I  and  the  others  of 
my  kind  concern  ourselves  with  aping  the  dress 
and  manners  of  these  society  people.  If  so, 
you  were  never  more  mistaken  in  your  life.  It 
is  they  who  copy  and  imitate  us.  They  go 
where  we  go,  they  wear  what  we  wear,  they 
eat  what  we  eat  and  they  drink  what  we  drink. 
Only,  as  is  always  the  case  with  imitators,  they 
fall  far  short  of  their  models.  How  is  it  pos- 


FROM   A   HOTEL    SPONGE      95 

sible  that  any  man  can  appear  the  perfect  gen- 
tleman of  leisure  unless,  indeed,  his  life  is 
actually  a  life  of  ease  and  pleasure?  We  have 
no  cares  and  no  responsibilities.  They  have  a 
thousand.  We  have  no  social  duties  to  distract 
our  attention.  They  are  constantly  consulting 
their  watches.  And,  lastly,  Sir,  we  have  art, 
and  they  have  none. 

I  can  not  imagine  what  has  led  these  mis- 
guided innkeepers  to  think  that  they  can  do 
without  us.  But  I  can  tell  you,  they  will  soon 
regret  their  recent  action,  whatever  motives 
may  have  moved  them  to  take  it,  for  they  will 
find  very  shortly  that  their  hotels  are  not  nearly 
so  necessary  to  us  as  we  are  to  their  hotels.  I 
am,  Sir, 

PERCIVAL  PIGEONBREAST. 


FROM  SARAH  SHELFWORN 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAE  SIR:  I  have  to  complain  of  an  abuse 
which  is  daily  growing  greater  and  which,  if 
not  checked,  will  soon  assume  the  proportions 
of  a  national  menace.  It  is  my  purpose,  Sir, 
to  call  to  your  attention  and  to  the  attention  of 
all  earnest  thinking  people,  a  pernicious  influ- 
ence exercised  by  a  certain  portion  of  our  daily 
press — by  those  vulgar  flaunting  publications 
known  as  "yellow  journals".  Now  do  not  mis- 
understand me,  Mr.  Idler;  this  letter  is  no  ill- 
considered  general  attack  upon  the  press;  no 
incoherent  or  fanatical  outcry  against  the  pub- 
lication of  disagreeable  facts.  It  is,  on  the 
contrary,  a  protest  against  a  certain  idealism 
which  pervades  the  pages  of  these  newspapers 
and  which  unduly  excites  the  imagination  of 
our  young  men.  I  do  not  refer  to  stories  of 
crime,  extravagance  or  anything  of  that  sort 

96 


FROM    SARAH    SHELFWORN    97 

— but  to  the  publication  of  pictures  of  beauti- 
ful women. 

You  may  ask,  what  possible  harm  can  come 
of  the  publication  of  these  pleasing  portraits? 
Well,  Sir,  I  will  tell  you ;  but  in  order  that  you 
may  understand  my  point  of  view,  I  must  first 
tell  you  something-  of  myself  and  explain 
somewhat,  my  own  experience. 

I,  Sir,  am  a  school-teacher — an  instructor  in 
English  literature — and  since  the  school  where 
I  am  employed  is  a  public  high  school,  it  is 
hardly  necessary  to  add,  I  am  a  woman.  Or 
perhaps  it  would  be  more  truthful  to  say  I  was 
a  woman  once  upon  a  time.  When  I  was  young 
and  fairly  pretty,  there  was  no  more  womanly 
woman  than  I  in  all  this  section  of  the  country, 
but  let  me  tell  you,  Sir,  ten  years  of  teaching 
school  is  an  experience  calculated  to  unsex  any 
person,  man  or  woman.  We  veteran  school- 
teachers constitute  what  a  magazine  writer  re- 
cently referred  to  as  "an  indeterminate  sex." 
We  have  left  in  us  nothing  of  the  masculine 
or  feminine  nature.  We  think,  feel,  argue  and 
reason  like  one  another  and  like  nobody  else  in 


98  NEW   BROOMS 

the  world — we  are  neuter  throughout.  It  is, 
perhaps,  for  this  reason  that  I  can  now  look 
back  upon  my  wasted  life  with  only  a  passing 
regret,  and  that  I  can,  without  any  feeling  of 
outraged  modesty  or  womanly  reserve,  lay 
bare  to  you  the  dreams  of  my  girlhood  and  the 
thoughts  of  my  maturity. 

To  begin,  then,  I  have  always  lived  in  the  lit- 
tle town  where  I  am  now  teaching,  though  to  be 
sure,  since  I  became  a  teacher,  I  have  traveled 
more  or  less  during  my  vacations.  I  have  vis- 
ited many  places  in  Europe  and  America  at 
one  time  or  another.  I  have  made  a  pilgrimage 
to  Stratford-on-Avon  six  times  in  as  many 
years,  and  it  is  perhaps  for  this  reason  that  I 
have  never  found  time  to  read  any  of  Shake- 
speare's works  beyond  the  four  or  five  plays 
which  we  read  in  class.  Be  that  as  it  may, 
when  I  was  a  girl  of  seventeen  or  eighteen,  I 
was  a  bright,  merry-hearted  young  creature 
who  had  not  a  care  in  the  world,  nor  a  thought 
for  anything  but  pleasure.  Not  that  I  was 
without  sentiment,  for  truth  to  tell,  I  was  as 
sentimental  as  any,  and  let  me  tell  you,  Sir, 


FROM    SARAH    SHELFWORN    99 

one  girl  of  eighteen  has  more  sentiment  in  her 
composition  than  all  of  the  old  men  in  the 
world.  I  say  "old  men,"  because  I  have  ob- 
served that  whereas  sentiment  comes  to  a 
woman  early  in  life,  so  that  she  is  soon  done 
with  it,  men  seldom  become  sentimental  until 
they  have  passed  middle  age.  And  that  is  why, 
Sir,  you  will  observe  in  the  restaurants  and 
cafes  of  your  city,  young  men  with  old  women 
and  old  men  with  young  women.  Like  is  nat- 
urally attracted  to  like.  The  old  man  loves  the 
young  woman  for  her  romanticism  which  is 
akin  to  his  own,  and  the  young  woman  loves  the 
old  man  because  he  is  not  ashamed  to  admit  his 
infatuation  and  glories  in  his  subjection  to  her 
charms.  The  young  man,  upon  the  other  hand, 
is  attracted  to  the  older  woman  by  her  knowl- 
edge of  the  world,  her  masculine  view-point,  her 
independence  of  mind,  her  air  of  good-fellow- 
ship, and  her  frank  acceptance  of  a  temporary 
affection.  The  old  woman  finds  in  the  young 
man  the  only  sensible,  sober  and  sane  being 
that  wears  trousers. 

As  I  say,  Sir,  I  was  as  sentimental  as  any; 


100  NEW   BROOMS 

I  had  my  girlish  dreams  of  home  and  fireside, 
of  husband  and  little  ones,  but  I  was  not  ob- 
sessed with  this  pleasant  dreaming.  I  took  all 
that  for  granted  as  my  natural  birthright,  and 
a  career  which  was  guaranteed  to  me  by  virtue 
of  my  very  womanhood.  I  was  cheerful,  a 
capable  housekeeper,  possessed  of  a  clear  com- 
plexion, good  eyes,  sound  teeth,  a  fair  figure — 
in  short,  I  was  passably  good-looking.  Why 
should  not  I  be  married  in  due  time,  as  my 
mother  was  before  me,  and  as  the  girls  of  my 
native  village  had  always  been?  I  was  not 
hump-backed,  bow-legged,  nor  squint-eyed.  I 
was  neither  a  shrew  nor  a  prude.  I  could  man- 
age a  house  and  (I  had  no  doubt)  I  could  man- 
age a  husband ;  how  could  I  fail  to  get  him? 

Alas!  Sir,  my  youthful  optimism  was  my 
undoing.  I  delayed  my  choice  and  I  lost  my 
opportunity.  I  refused  one  or  two  offers  of 
marriage  that  came  to  me  in  the  first  flush  of 
my  womanhood — and  I  have  never  since  re- 
ceived another!  The  young  men  of  our  town 
had  always  married  our  home  girls.  With  the 
exception  of  a  few  prodigals  who  left  home 


FROM    SARAH    SHELFWORN  101 

to  see  the  world  and  who  never  returned,  some 
going  to  jail  and  some  to  congress,  none  of  our 
young  men  sought  their  wives  among  stran- 
gers. They  were  well  content  with  what  they 
found  at  home.  How,  then,  could  I  anticipate 
a  sudden  exodus  of  eligible  young  men?  An 
exodus,  I  say!  For  an  exodus  it  was,  and  an 
exodus  it  has  continued,  year  by  year,  ever 
since  that  fatal  day  when  Willie  Titheridge 
Talbott  went  over  to  Ithaca  and  married  Min- 
na Meyerbeer  who  won  the  Tompkins  County 
beauty  contest! 

No  sooner  do  our  young  men  arrive 
at  that  age  when  they  can  don  a  fuzzy 
hat  and  coax  a  mustache  without  exciting  the 
ridicule  of  their  little  brothers,  than  they  shake 
the  dust  of  this  town  from  their  feet  and  set 
out  to  find  a  wife  among  those  vampire  beau- 
ties whose  portraits  decorate  the  pages  of  our 
Sunday  papers.  As  for  our  girls,  they  are  left 
as  I  was,  to  choose  between  frank  spinsterhood 
at  home,  or  to  follow  the  young  men  out  into 
the  world,  there  to  become  chorus  girls,  mani- 
cures, stenographers — or  to  engage  in  some 


102  NEW   BROOMS 

other  similar  profession  which  exerts  such  a 
glamour  and  fascination  over  the  men  as  to 
make  up  for  their  lack  of  classical  beauty. 

And  who,  Sir,  is  to  blame  for  this  lamentable 
state  of  affairs?  The  beauties?  No,  not  alto- 
gether, for  if  they  were  not  so  exploited  by  the 
newspapers,  our  young  men  would  never  sus- 
pect that  they  existed.  For,  Sir,  even  if  he 
were  to  meet  her  face  to  face,  the  ordinary 
young  man  is  so  lacking  in  sentiment,  so  mat- 
ter-of-fact, that  he  would  never  suspect  one  of 
those  beauties  of  being  anything  extraordinary 
if  her  beauty  were  not  vouched  for  by  some 
newspaper.  The  young  man  who  has  not  been 
corrupted  in  this  way,  and  who  has  not  had 
fostered  in  him  by  these  newspapers  the  silly 
notion  that  he  is  a  knight  errant  searching  the 
world  for  beauty  in  distress,  is  a  docile  crea- 
ture, easily  captured  and  easily  managed.  He 
treats  matrimony  as  he  treats  his  meals,  he 
takes  what  is  set  before  him  and  afterward 
grumbles  as  a  matter  of  course,  but  deep  down 
in  his  heart  he  is  very  well  satisfied.  It  is  the 
editors.  Sir,  who  have  caused  all  of  the  trouble ; 


FROM    SARAH    SHELFWORN  103 

the  editors  with  their  silly  beauty  contests  and 
their  simpering  half-tone,  half -world  women  of 
the  stage  flaunting  their  coquettish  graces  and 
flirting  with  our  young  men  from  the  pages  of 
the  Sunday  papers. 

Now,  Sir,  I  hope  that  you  will  not  dismiss 
this  letter  as  a  matter  of  no  consequence  and 
the  peevish  complaint  of  a  disappointed  spin- 
ster, for  I  assure  you  the  roots  of  this  evil  go 
deeper  than  appears  at  first  glance.  Our  maga- 
zines are  asking,  "Why  do  young  men  leave 
the  farm?"  Our  sociologists  are  asking  why  are 
our  villages  becoming  depopulated?  Super- 
ficial observers  often  reply  that  the  young  men 
go  to  the  city  for  the  sake  of  money-making. 
But  I,  Sir,  know  better.  The  young  men  are 
leaving  the  farms  and  the  villages  to  hunt  for 
wives  because  the  newspapers,  with  their  photo- 
graphs, have  made  them  dissatisfied  with  what 
they  find  at  home.  And  now  that  you  know 
the  cause  of  it,  Mr.  Idler,  is  there  no  hope  that 
you  may  devise  some  way  to  put  a  stop  to  it? 
I  am,  Sir, 

SARAH  SHELFWORN. 


FROM  ANNA  PEST 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR  :  Doubtless  you  are  familiar  with 
some  of  the  newer  schools  of  poetry,  as  for  in- 
stance, that  one  which  has  abandoned  rhyme  for 
assonance,  which  has  led  an  ignorant  and 
prejudiced  critic  to  say  of  it  that  its  po- 
etry may  be  rich  in  assonance,  but  that  he  finds 
in  it  more  of  asininity.  Such  is  the  treatment 
accorded  all  independent  artists  by  the  hide- 
bound adherents  of  outworn  ideals! 

Now,  Mr.  Idler,,  nobody  is  more  convinced 
than  I  am  that  we  need  new  forms  of  poetry. 
I  have  been  writing  poems  for  a  number  of 
years  and  I  feel  that  I  speak  with  authority 
when  I  say  that  the  old  classical  forms  are  en- 
tirely inadequate  for  modern  poetic  expression. 
I  have  tried  them  all  and  I  have  found  them 
all  wanting,  for  though  I  have  written  poems 
in  the  form  of  sonnets,  lyrics,  triolets,  quat- 

104 


FROM   ANNA   PESX  105 

rains,  couplets,  rondels — and  even  in  blank 
verse — I  was  never  able  to  produce  a  decent 
poem  in  any  of  them.  I  therefore  conclude  that 
what  every  modern  poet  needs  is  to  shake  off 
the  shackles  of  poetic  convention  and  follow 
a  form  suited  to  his  nature.  I  have  been  greatly 
encouraged  by  the  introduction  of  the  vers  libre 
in  France  and  I  am  heartily  in  accord  with  the 
aims  of  those  pioneers  of  the  new  poetry  who 
are  laboring  to  educate  the  public  taste  to  mod- 
ern ideals,  but  I  fear  that  in  one  or  two  in- 
stances they  have  overshot  the  mark. 

Much  as  I  admire  the  courage  of  Mon- 
sieur Alexandre  Mercereau,  who  has,  with 
splendid  audacity,  forsaken  verse  altogether 
and  determined  to  write  all  of  his  po- 
etry in  prose,  I  do  not  believe  it  advisable 
to  attempt  to  accomplish  the  poetic  revolution 
at  one  step.  I  am  more  in  sympathy  with  those 
who  have  abandoned  rhyme,  but  retained 
rhythm. 

For  my  own  part,  I  have  invented  a 
form  which  I  think  better  than  either.  I  be- 
lieve that  this  form  is  as  superior  to  the  sonnet 


106  NEW   BROOMS 

as  the  sonnet  is  to  the  limerick.  I  call  this  form 
the  duocapet  because  it  is,  in  a  sense,  double- 
headed,  having  two  rhyming  words  in  every 
line — one  at  each  end.  I  have  discarded  rhythm 
but  retained  rhyme.  I  had  good  reasons  for 
adopting  this  course.  I  regard  meter  as  a  use- 
less encumbrance.  It  is  meter,  not  rhyme, 
which  hampers  the  true  poet.  The  poet  should 
be  free — free  as  the  air — free  as  the  birds.  It 
is  a  crime  against  art  to  bind  him  with  silly 
meaningless  meters  and  rhythms  which  distract 
his  attention  from  his  theme  and  serve  only  to 
furnish  critics  with  an  excuse  for  picking  flaws. 
I  hope  that  the  happy  day  will  soon  arrive 
when  laymen  will  leave  to  the  poets  the  settling 
of  all  questions  of  form,  but  in  the  present 
state  of  public  ignorance  and  prejudice  I  think 
it  advisable  to  concede  them  something  in  or- 
der that  they  may  realize  that  we  are  writing 
poetry.  Later,  when  the  public  is  sufficiently 
educated  to  recognize  poetry  without  any  of 
its  ancient  ear-marks,  I  may  discard  rhyme 
also. 

For  the  present  I  think  the  duocapet  is  the 


FROM   ANNA   PEST  107 

most  logical  and  artistic  of  existing  forms. 
Writing  in  the  duocapet  s  the  poet  has  only  one 
rule  to  observe — that  the  first  word  of  every 
line  shall  rhyme  with  the  last.  I  have,  in  fact, 
reduced  the  couplet  to  a  single  line,  making 
the  two  rhyming  words  come  one  at  each  end 
of  that  line,  where  they  logically  belong,  one 
opening  and  one  closing  the  line,  instead  of 
placing  them  one  under  the  other  in  the  manner 
of  Pope.  Standing  in  this  position  they  may 
be  likened  to  two  sentries  that  guard  the 
thought  of  the  poet.  It  is  as  if  the  rhyme  at 
the  first  end  of  the  line  called  out,  "Who  goes 
there?"  and  the  other  responds,  "A  friend  1"  In 
the  duocapet  the  poet  may  make  his  lines  short 
or  long  as  best  pleases  him  without  regard  for 
the  length  of  lines  that  go  before  or  that 
follow. 

This  poetry  is  produced  as  all  true  poetry 
should  be  produced,  a  line  at  a  time.  No  whole 
can  be  perfect  which  is  defective  in  any  part. 
In  the  duocapet  every  line  is  a  perfect  poem, 
complete  in  itself,  every  line  contains  a  distinct 
thought,  and  though  the  sentence  may  some- 


108  NEW    BROOMS 

times  extend  from  one  line  to  another,  this  is 
never  necessary  and  rests  with  the  discretion 
of  the  poet.  Should  he  choose,  he  might  write 
a  whole  poem  consisting  of  nothing  but  com- 
plete sentences,  a  sentence  a  line,  with  a  period 
at  the  end  of  each.  The  poem  can  be  made  ten 
lines  in  length  or  ten  thousand,  and  asterisks 
and  italics  can  be  introduced  at  will.  With  the 
exception  of  the  rhyme,  the  poet  is  as  free  in 
this  form  as  in  any  form  of  vers  Wore.  I  ap- 
pend an  example  of  duocapet  which  should 
give  you  a  good  idea  of  the  possibilities  of  this 
form: 

MIDNIGHT 

Gone  is  the  day  and  I  look  out  upon 
Night  bathed  in  Luna's  sad  illusive  light   .    .    . 
Dark  are  the  shadows  out  in  Central  Park ; 
Hushed  are  the  streets  through  which  the  traffic 

rushed    .    .    . 

See!  Underneath  that  weeping-willow  tree 
Prone  lies  a  figure  on  a  bench  alone! 
Why  should  he  lie  there  'neath  the  sky? 
Is  there  no  home  he  can  call  his? 
Creeps  now  the  moonlight  where  he  sleeps  .  .  < 


FROM    ANNA   PEST  109 

Shakes  then  the  outcast  as  he  wakes, 
Chill  with  the  bitter  winds  that  fill 
All  of  the  Park  from  wall  to  wall. 
Slinks  then  away  in  search  of  drinks. 
Soon  he  will  be  in  a  saloon. 
Still  as  I  lean  upon  the  sill 
And  see  the  sky  on  every  hand 
Sprinkled  with  those  same  stars  that  twinkled 
Bright  on  that  blessed  Christmas  night 
When  angels  sang  good-will  to  men    .    .    . 
Sore  is  my  heart  unto  the  core ! 
Sick  is  my  soul  unto  the  quick! 
Sick  is  my  soul   „    .    .   my  soul   .    .    .   how 
sick! 

I  hope  that  you  will  publish  this  poem  and 
letter  in  the  interest  of  Poetic  Art,  and  in  or- 
der that  the  world  may  know  that  we  poets  of 
America  are  almost,  if  not  quite,  as  progressive 
as  those  of  France. 

I  am,  Sir, 

ANNA  PEST. 


FROM  SETH  SHIRTLESS 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  am  the  victim  of  a  most  pecu- 
liar affliction.  I  am  suffering  from  what  ap- 
pears to  be  a  sort  of  disease  and  which  can  not 
be  classified.  As  I  am  not  able  to  find  the  true 
explanation  of  this  matter  myself  and  as  phy- 
sicians seem  to  be  equally  at  a  loss  in  regard  to 
it,  I  have  decided  to  appeal  to  the  public  at 
large  in  the  hope  that  some  one  who  reads  my 
communication  will  be  able  to  suggest  a  cure 
or  at  least  some  method  of  alleviation. 

There  is  an  old  saying,  Mr.  Idler,  borrowed 
from  some  author,  if  I  mistake  not,  that  "the 
apparel  oft  proclaims  the  man."  This  I  con- 
sider a  true  saying  aptly  put;  but  I  believe,  Sir, 
that  apparel  sometimes  does  more  than  pro- 
claim the  man — that  it  sometimes  actually 
makes  the  man.  It  is  well  known  that  men  are 
often  affected  by  the  clothes  they  wear.  Good 

110 


FROM    SETH    SHIRTLESS     111 

clothing  has  a  tendency  to  inspire  confidence 
in  the  breast  of  the  wearer,  while  poor  clothing 
robs  a  man  of  his  assurance,  if  not  of  his  self- 
respect.  That  all  men  are  more  or  less  subject 
to  the  influence  of  their  garments,  there  can  be 
no  doubt,  but  I,  Sir,  am  peculiarly  susceptible 
to  it.  It  has  been  so  all  my  life.  Even  in  child- 
hood I  became  supercilious  and  insolent  with 
pride  when  clad  in  my  best,  and  most  envious 
and  depressed  the  moment  I  had  changed  to 
my  every-day  wear. 

Since  I  have  come  to  manhood,  I  have  felt 
this  weakness  growing  upon  me  despite  my 
most  earnest  efforts  to  resist  it,  until  now,  Mr. 
Idler,  my  character  and  my  wardrobe  are  so  in- 
extricably mixed  together  that  I  may  be  said 
to  change  my  nature  with  my  clothing.  When 
I  am  richly  dressed  I  feel  rich,  and  my 
thoughts  and  sentiments  are  those  of  a  wealthy 
person.  At  such  times  I  am  a  firm  believer  in 
all  measures  for  the  protection  of  property  and 
vested  rights.  I  am  a  hearty  adherent  of  the 
established  order  and  I  am  distinctly  suspicious 
of  all  so-called  reforms  and  innovations  in  gov- 


112  NEW   BROOMS 

ernmental  machinery.  When,  on  the  other 
hand,  I  am  dressed  shabbily,  my  views  and  my 
feelings  undergo  a  complete  change.  I  am  no 
longer  a  believer  in  the  sacredness  of  property 
rights.  Indeed,  I  look  upon  all  rich  men  as 
so  many  robbers  who  have  seized  upon  the  land 
and  the  natural  resources  which  should,  of 
right,  be  the  common  property  of  all  mankind. 
I  feel  that  I  have  been  defrauded  of 
everything  they  have  which  I  have  not. 
Their  insolence  vexes  me  and  their  display 
drives  me  into  a  very  fury  of  rage  which  is 
partly  inspired  by  just  indignation  and  partly 
by  simple  envy.  At  these  times  I  am  fiercely 
radical  in  politics.  No  measure  of  reform  can 
be  too  revolutionary  for  my  taste.  My  dearest 
wish  is  that  the  whole  social  fabric  may  be  rent 
to  shreds  and  rewoven  in  a  pattern  after  my 
democratic  heart. 

To  such  extremes  of  sentiment  do  my 
clothes  carry  me.  When  I  am  fashionably  clad 
a  Socialistic  pamphlet  irritates  me  as  a  red  rag 
enrages  a  bull.  But  when  I  am  poorly  dressed 
and  shod,  /  write  such  pamphlets.  Write  them, 


FROM    SETH    SHIRTLESS     113 

and,  Sir,  incredible  as  it  may  seem,  leave  them 
lying  about  my  quarters  for  the  very  purpose 
of  irritating  myself,  and  well  knowing  that 
when  my  eyes  light  on  them  while  in  my  con- 
servative frame  of  mind  I  shall  fall  upon  them 
and  tear  them  to  tatters.  I,  Sir,  am  as  a  house 
divided  against  itself — I  am  a  man  at  war  with 
his  own  soul ! 

You  have  heard,  I  doubt  not,  of  the  cele- 
brated case  of  Doctor  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde, 
and  of  other  instances  of  double  personality, 
where  men,  by  reason  of  contending  spirits 
within  them,  have  been  forced  to  lead  double 
lives.  I  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  such  are 
blessed  when  their  lot  is  compared  to  my  own 
unhappy  state,  for  I  lead,  not  a  double,  but  a 
treble  existence.  In  addition  to  these  two  per- 
sonalities, which  I  term  for  want  of  a  better 
nomenclature  my  Aristocratic  and  my  Proleta- 
rian selves,  I  am  also  possessed  of  a  Normal 
self  which  is  in  evidence  only  when  I  am  com- 
pletely disrobed. 

Can  you  fancy,  Sir,  what  this  means  to  me  ? 
Can  you  imagine  in  what  straits  a  man  must  be 


114  NEW   BROOMS 

who  can  think  clearly  and  logically  only  when 
he  is  naked,  and  who,  before  he  can  decide  upon 
any  matter  of  importance,  must  hurry  home 
and  throw  off  his  clothes  lest  he  be  led  astray 
by  rabid  prejudice  or  blind  enthusiasm?  That, 
Sir,  is  precisely  my  situation.  When  I  awake 
in  the  morning  I  am  compelled  to  make  a 
choice  between  my  two  antagonistic  personali- 
ties. My  wardrobe  stares  me  in  the  face  as  if 
asking  the  eternal  question,  "Which  is  it  to  be 
to-day — Aristocrat  or  Proletariat?"  Always, 
upon  falling  asleep  at  night,  I  am  haunted  by 
the  specter  of  the  ordeal  which  awaits  me  in  the 
morning. 

In  addition  to  this,  my  Aristocratic  and  my 
Proletarian  selves  have  recently  conceived  a 
violent  dislike  for  each  other  and  they  have 
begun  to  vent  their  spite  in  many  petty  ways, 
much  to  the  disgust  of  my  Normal  self  who 
has  small  use  for  either  of  them.  For  example, 
about  a  fortnight  ago,  my  Proletarian  self  in- 
dulged himself  freely  in  gin,  a  drink  which  is 
loathsome  to  my  Aristocratic  self.  He  stayed 


in  this  condition  for  a  matter  of  four  days 
and  upon  his  return  to  my — perhaps  I  should 
say  our  chambers,  he  wantonly  destroyed  a  new 
top  hat  which  my  Aristocratic  self  had  care- 
lessly left  lying1  upon  the  hall  table.  By  way 
of  retaliation,  my  Aristocratic  self  seized  some 
overalls  belonging  to  my  Proletarian  self  and 
flung  them  into  the  ash-barrel.  Altogether, 
they  behave,  Sir,  in  a  fashion  to  make  me  thor- 
oughly ashamed  of  them  both. 

Possibly  you  are  wondering  how  it  comes 
that  I  am  in  the  habit  of  changing  my  clothing 
so  frequently  and  varying  the  quality  of  my 
dress  in  this  way.  I  may  as  well  tell  you  that 
for  many  years  I  was  a  professional  politician, 
much  in  demand  as  an  orator,  and  that  I  was 
called  to  speak  before  audiences  of  widely  dif- 
ferent character,  so  that  I  sometimes  found  it 
expedient  to  dress  in  evening  clothes  and  at 
other  times  it  was  necessary  for  me  to  appear 
a  workingman.  My  constantly  changing  po- 
litical convictions  made  it  impossible  for  me  to 
continue  in  this  work,  but  by  the  time  I  gave  it 


116  NEW   BROOMS 

up  I  had  come  to  know  these  two  personalities 
so  well  that  I  was  unwilling  to  trust  myself 
for  long  in  the  hands  of  either  of  them.  I  have 
thought  of  purchasing  a  decent  outfit  of  ready- 
to-wear  clothing,  but  I  realize  that  the  result 
of  such  a  step  would  be  to  render  me  hopelessly 
middle-class,  a  condition  I  have  hitherto  es- 
caped. I  have  no  desire  to  add  a  fourth  per- 
sonality to  those  I  already  possess. 

I  have  consulted  my  tailor  without  good  re- 
sult, and  the  best  that  my  physician  has  been 
able  to  do  for  me  was  to  suggest  a  period  of 
rest  in  the  country.  I  am  now  very  comfort- 
ably lodged  in  a  quiet  house  in  the  suburbs, 
where  I  came  upon  the  advice  of  my  doctor 
and  two  of  his  colleagues  with  whom  I  dis- 
cussed my  trouble. 

I  am  very  well  content  here  for  a  man  who  is 
virtually  a  prisoner.  Not  that  I  am  confined  by 
force,  Sir,  but  I  have  determined  never  to  put 
on  another  suit  of  clothes  until  I  have  solved 
the  problem  which  confronts  me,  and  I  can  not 
leave  my  room  without  dressing;  the  landlord 
of  this  place  objects  to  my  doing  so.  Here, 


FROM    SETH    SHIRTLESS     117 

then,  I  expect  to  remain  until  I  hit  upon  some 
solution  of  my  difficulty  or  until  some  other 
person  is  good  enough  to  suggest  a  way  out 
of  my  dilemma.  I  am,  Sir, 

SETH  SHIRTLESS. 


SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  am  a  social  worker,  and  it 
is  in  this  capacity  that  I  address  you  upon  a 
subject  which  appears  to  me  to  be  of  vital  im- 
portance to  all  classes  of  society.  I  have,  Sir, 
hit  upon  a  plan  which  will,  if  generally  adopt- 
ed, work  the  greatest  reform  that  has  ever  been 
effected,  and  which  will,  I  am  convinced,  com- 
pletely do  away  with  the  necessity  for  long- 
term  sentences  to  imprisonment.  In  simple 
honesty  I  must  admit  that  this  idea  is  not  en- 
tirely my  own.  It  was  suggested  to  me  by  the 
extraordinary  and  very  interesting  communi- 
cation from  Mr.  Seth  Shirtless  which  appeared 
in  your  January  issue. 

The  influence  of  clothing  upon  character  has 
long  been  recognized,  but  I  do  not  remember 
ever  to  have  heard  of  another  case  so  well  illus- 
trating that  influence  as  the  case  of  Mr.  Shirt  - 

118 


SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY        119 

less.  His  story  of  his  experiences  was  pro- 
foundly interesting  from  a  psychological  point 
of  view,  and  while  reading  it  I  conceived  the 
plan  of  which  I  spoke  just  now.  It  occurred  to 
me  that  the  influence  of  dress  might  be  of  great 
use  in  reforming  men  of  evil  habit  and  tem- 
perament. It  is  well  known  to  all  social  work- 
ers that  many  criminals  cherish  a  spirit  of  bitter 
animosity  toward  society  at  large,  and  that  not 
a  few  habitual  criminals  have  embarked  upon 
a  career  of  crime  urged  on  by  the  mistaken  be- 
lief that  the  hand  of  every  man  was  against 
them.  Having  once  plunged  into  evil  ways, 
these  misguided  creatures  come  to  be  more  and 
more  of  the  opinion  that  they  are  not  as  other 
men;  that  they  have  lost  for  all  time  to  come 
any  hope  of  being  treated  with  respect  and  that 
they  must  live  and  die  outside  the  pale  of  re- 
spectability. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  the  treatment 
now  accorded  them,  both  in  jail  and  after 
their  release,  lends  some  color  of  truth 
to  this  conviction.  To  win  these  men  back  to  a 
useful  way  of  life  it  is  only  necessary  to  show 


120  NEW    BROOMS 

them  that  they  are  wrong;  that  a  temporary 
fall  from  grace  does  not  involve  an  eternal  and 
perpetual  atonement.  They  must  be  made  to 
feel  that  they  are  still  members  of  the  Brother- 
hood of  Man  and  that  they  may  again  become 
members  in  good  standing.  Once  they  are  con- 
vinced of  this,  they  will  certainly  mend  their 
ways  and  gladly  conform  to  right  standards  of 
living.  Society  is  coming  to  realize,  as  it  never 
did  before,  that  the  true  purpose  of  imprison- 
ment is  to  reform,  and  not  to  punish ;  that  our 
criminals  and  law-breakers  are  susceptible  to 
the  same  methods  as  our  children,  and  that  our 
proceedings  against  them  should  be  corrective, 
rather  than  retaliatory.  These  men  are  sick, 
sick  in  mind  if  not  in  body,  and  it  is  the  duty 
of  the  state  to  reclaim  them. 

In  consequence  of  this  awakening  to  the 
real  purpose  of  imprisonment,  many  of  our 
prisons  have  given  up  the  hideous  practise  of 
dressing  convicts  in  the  degrading  and  brutal- 
izing uniforms  which  were  formerly  so  com- 
mon as  to  be  almost  universal  in  penal  institu- 
tions. Men  have  pretty  generally  come  to  see 


SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY        121 

that  the  use  of  the  striped  zebra-like  suit  for 
prisoners  was  a  mistake;  an  added  infamy 
which  served  no  good  purpose,  but  only  deep- 
ened the  convict's  sense  of  shame  and  resent- 
ment. But  though  the  old  garb  for  prisoners  is 
rapidly  becoming  obsolete,  all  reform  of  this 
character  has,  so  far,  been  negative  in  its  na- 
ture. The  method  which  I  propose  is  positive. 
Why  should  we  be  content  with  relieving  the 
convicts  of  their  shameful  uniforms?  Why  not 
go  a  step  further  and  institute  a  constructive 
reform  in  their  dress?  Why  not  array  them  in 
such  a  fashion  that  their  self-respect  must  be 
reawakened  and  their  sense  of  responsibility 
quickened  into  life?  Why  not  bring  to  bear 
upon  their  characters  the  influence  of  clean 
linen  and  a  respectable  wardrobe? 

What  I  propose,  Mr.  Idler,  is  just  this:  Let 
every  convict  and  prisoner  be  clad  in  clothing 
suitable  for  a  substantial  citizen  and  a  respected 
member  of  the  community.  Let  every  inmate 
of  our  prisons  and  penitentiaries  be  supplied 
each  week  with  a  liberal  allowance  of  clean 
linen  and  underwear.  Let  every  man  of  them 


122  NEW   BROOMS 

be  furnished  with  a  decent  wardrobe ;  say,  two 
or  three  business  suits  of  good  quality  and  cor- 
rect cut,  a  walking-coat  or  frock  for  afternoon 
wear,  evening  dress,  a  silk  hat  and  a  dinner 
coat.  We  already  provide  for  them  good  books 
to  elevate  their  minds;  let  us  now  give  them 
such  attire  as  will  increase  their  respect  for 
their  persons. 

Now,  there  is  no  denying  that  a  well-dressed 
man  makes  a  better  impression  upon  strangers 
than  a  sloven;  and  if  this  is  true  of  strangers, 
what  shall  we  say  of  the  effect  upon  the  man 
himself?  While  few  of  us  are  so  strongly  af- 
fected as  Mr.  Shirtless,  yet  we  are  all  of  us,  I 
think,  affected  in  some  degree.  A  pleasing 
image  in  a  mirror  increases  our  self-respect, 
but  when  we  see  ourselves  unkempt  and  ill-clad 
we  are  ashamed.  When  we  have  made  our 
prisoners  presentable,  I  believe  we  should  give 
them  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  how  much  they 
are  improved,  and  I  therefore  suggest  that  a 
mirror  be  placed  in  each  cell  where  the  inmate 
can  see  himself  at  full  length.  Thus,  if  in  spite 
of  his  new  outfit  he  occasionally  feels  a  dispo- 


SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY        123 

sition  to  backslide,  he  has  only  to  glance  into 
the  glass  to  be  restored  to  respectability.  In 
this  way  he  can  be  led  to  see  the  possibilities 
within  him.  Let  a  man  look  into  a  looking- 
glass  and  see  there  a  reflection  which  might 
well  be  that  of  a  statesman,  and  his  subcon- 
sciousness  will  at  once  inquire  why  not?  (The 
inspiring  sight  will  reawaken  his  ambition. 

Though  it  will  be  a  great  step  forward  to 
dress  these  convicts  like  decent  citizens,  yet  this 
is  hardly  enough.  There  must  be  a  correspond- 
ing reform  in  their  occupations  and  employ- 
ments. There  is  certainly  something  incongru- 
ous in  the  thought  of  a  man  clad  in  a  frock  coat 
and  silk  hat  breaking  stones  with  a  hammer. 
Such  a  thing  must  appear  bizarre  even  to  the 
dullest  of  these  unfortunates.  To  keep  them  at 
such  labor  would  seem  as  if  we  were  mak- 
ing sport  of  them.  It  will  therefore  be  ad- 
visable to  devise  for  each  inmate  of  our  prisons 
some  employment  which  will  be  in  keeping 
with  his  clothes  and,  at  the  same  time,  congenial 
and  respectable.  Here  is  a  man,  let  us  say,  who 
has  been  convicted  of  larceny.  We  will  make 


124  NEW   BROOMS 

a  promoter  of  him.  Here  is  another  who  has 
been  sentenced  for  gambling.  He  would  make 
a  good  broker.  A  third,  who  has  been  an  an- 
archist, will  make  a  good  magazine  editor.  A 
fourth,  confined  for  highway  robbery,  can  be 
transformed  into  a  hotel  proprietor.  And  so 
on  down  the  list. 

Of  course  it  will  be  necessary  to  release 
some  of  them  upon  parole  when  the  time 
comes  for  them  to  begin  the  practise  of 
their  professions,  but  by  the  time  they  have 
mastered  the  details  of  their  new  callings  this 
will  probably  be  safe  enough.  If  a  carpenter 
has  been  sent  to  prison  for  burglary,  it  is  not 
reasonable  to  keep  him  employed  at  the  same 
trade  while  in  confinement,  for  then  he  is  re- 
leased knowing  no  more — and  no  better  off — 
than  he  was  when  incarcerated.  Perhaps  it 
was  carpentry  which  drove  him  to  crime.  No, 
Mr.  Idler,  we  should  elevate  him. 

As  for  those  who  are  merely  dissolute  and 
idle,  we  will  make  gentlemen  of  them.  We  will 
dress  them  in  the  latest  fashion  and  establish 
for  them  a  club  where  they  may  follow  their 


SARTOR-PSYCHOLOGY        125 

natural  bent  and  continue  in  their  usual  habits, 
only  now  with  the  sanction  of  society. 

If  the  system  I  have  outlined  should  be 
adopted  in  all  of  our  prisons,  Sir,  I  see  no  rea- 
son why  our  convicts  should  not  soon  be  a 
credit  to  the  community. 

I  am,  Sir, 

AL.  TEUIST. 


MR.  BODY  PROTESTS 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  It  is  with  a  feeling  of  dismay — 
nay,  I  may  even  say  terror — that  I  read  in  my 
morning  paper  the  statement  that  during 
last  year  there  were  made  and  sold  in  the 
United  States  no  less  than  8,644,537,090  cigar- 
ettes! Nearly  nine  billion  of  these  devil's 
torches,  or  almost  one  hundred  of  them  for 
every  man,  woman  and  child  throughout  the 
country.  And  not  only  that,  hut  an  increase  of 
150,000,000  cigars  and  15,000,000  pounds  of 
manufactured  tobacco  over  the  production  of 
the  preceding  year. 

To  what,  Sir,  is  this  country  coming,  when 
such  things  are  possible?  Can  it  be  that  the 
whole  nation  is  bent  upon  suicide  ?  I  have  read 
that  a  single  drop  of  the  pure  essense  of  nico- 
tine dropped  upon  the  back  of  a  healthy  and 
robust  flea  will  cause  the  unfortunate  beast  to 

126 


MR.    BODY   PROTESTS         127 

fall  into  convulsions,  frequently  terminating 
in  a  partial  paralysis  or  total  dissolution.  Now, 
it  is  well  known  to  all  who  make  the  slightest 
pretense  to  any  knowledge  of  entomology  that 
the  flea,  or  Pulex  irritans,  is  one  of  the  most 
hardy  insects  known  to  man  and  is  extremely 
hard  to  kill.  Indeed,  it  is  a  matter  of  record 
that  the  fleas  of  Mexico  encountered  the  army 
of  Bonaparte  and  Maximilian  and  gave  such 
a  good  account  of  themselves  that  the  French 
soldiers  were  more  in  awe  of  the  fleas  than  of 
the  natives.  If  nicotine,  then,  has  such  a  dis- 
astrous effect  upon  such  a  hearty  and  well- 
protected  beast  as  the  flea,  what  must  be  the 
effect  of  its  poison  upon  man,  who  is,  per- 
haps, the  most  easily  killed  of  all  living  crea- 
tures ?  It  is  too  horrible  to  contemplate !  I  have, 
by  most  careful  calculations,  proved  to  my  en- 
tire satisfaction  that  the  American  people  have 
already  been  totally  exterminated  through 
their  persistence  in  this  evil  habit  of  using  to- 
bacco ;  and  if,  as  may  be  said,  the  facts  do  not 
seem  to  fit  in  with  my  figures,  I  can  only  say 
that  I  am  convinced  that  their  survival  is  in 


128  NEW    BROOMS 

nowise  due  either  to  their  hardiness  or  to  the 
innocuous  character  of  the  herb,  but  solely  to 
the  kindly  interposition  of  Providence,  who, 
unwilling  to  see  so  young  and  so  promising  a 
nation  perish  by  reason  of  this  folly,  has  de- 
liberately set  at  naught  the  wiles  of  the  Devil 
and  robbed  him  of  his  prey  by  fortifying  and 
strengthening  the  constitutions  of  this  people 
to  withstand  the  dread  effects  of  this  evil  prac- 
tise. But  how  long  can  people  given  over  to 
this  wicked  practise  look  to  Providence  for 
patience  and  protection? 

I  have  but  now  spoken  of  the  American  peo- 
ple as  a  promising  nation,  but  I  am  not  sure 
but  that  I  should  amend  this  to  "a  once  prom- 
ising nation."  I  believe  that  this  nation  can 
never  become  truly  great  until  it  has  become 
a  nation  of  non-smokers.  Did  the  Greeks 
smoke?  No.  Did  the  Romans  smoke?  No, 
again.  Not  in  the  history  of  any  of  the  great 
nations  of  antiquity  do  I  find  a  single  refer- 
ence to  tobacco  smoking.  The  Boers  are  re- 
puted to  be  great  smokers,  and  it  is  to  this  that 
I  attribute  their  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the 


MR.    BODY   PROTESTS        129 

English.  I  have  heard  that  the  Boers  even 
went  into  battle  with  their  pipes  alight,  and  I 
have  no  doubt  that  it  was  due  to  their  distrac- 
tion and  lack  of  attention  caused  by  their  habit 
of  scratching  matches  to  keep  their  pipes  burn- 
ing, that  they  lost  many  important  engage- 
ments. Do  you  imagine,  Sir,  that  Troy  could 
have  withstood  the  assault  of  the  Greeks  for 
ten  long  years,  had  Hector  and  his  fellow  war- 
riors lolled  upon  the  battlements  puffing  on 
cigarettes?  Can  you  fancy,  Sir,  the  grave  and 
dignified  Cicero  pausing  in  the  midst  of  one  of 
his  philippics  to  expectorate  tobacco  juice?  Yet 
I  am  told  upon  good  authority  that  this  may 
be  witnessed  among  the  learned  justices  of  our 
own  Supreme  Court. 

The  almost  total  destruction  of  the  Amer- 
ican Indian,  I  attribute  chiefly  to  the  debilitat- 
ing effects  of  this  narcotic.  Of  all  of  the 
American  Indians,  the  Peruvians  attained  the 
highest  state  of  civilization.  And  why?  Be- 
cause, Sir,  they  alone  used  tobacco  only  as  a 
medicine  and  in  the  form  of  snuff.  Had  they 
forborne  the  use  of  snuff,  it  might  well  have 


130  NEW   BROOMS 

been  that  the  Incas  had  conquered  the  Spanish 
and  colonized  the  coast  of  Europe.  Snuff,  I 
consider  the  least  harmful  of  all  forms  of  to- 
bacco; but  only  because  it  is  the  least  fre- 
quently used.  There  is  a  lady  of  my  acquaint- 
ance, in  all  other  respects  a  most  estimable 
woman,  who  so  far  forgets  her  duty  as  a 
mother  as  to  permit  her  offspring  to  utilize  as 
a  plaything  a  handsome  silver  snuff-box  which 
she  inherited  from  her  grandfather.  I,  Sir, 
should  as  soon  think  of  giving  my  children  a 
whisky-flask  for  a  toy.  I  am  well  aware  that 
many  who  have  been  termed  "gentlemen"  have 
been  addicted  to  the  use  of  snuff;  nay,  that  it 
was  even  at  one  time  a  fashion  among  men  and 
women  of  the  mode  to  partake  of  it.  But  I 
think  none  the  better  of  it  for  that.  As  much 
might  be  said  for  rum. 

Lord  Chesterfield  said  that  he  was  enabled 
to  get  through  the  last  five  or  six  books  of  Vir- 
gil by  having  frequent  recourse  to  his  snuff- 
box ;  but  I  say,  if  the  taking  of  snuff  is  neces- 
sary to  the  enjoyment  of  Virgil,  why  then,  it 
were  better  never  to  read  that  poet.  I  had 


MR.    BODY   PROTESTS        131 

rather  fall  asleep  over  Virgil  than  to  inhale 
culture  tainted  with  snuff.  I  had  rather,  in- 
deed, snore  over  the  classics,  than  sneeze  at 
them.  Trdhlt  sua  quemque  voluptas — I  sus- 
pect that  his  Lordship  did  not  so  much  find 
snuff  an  aid  to  Virgil  as  Virgil  an  excuse  for 
snuff. 

Tobacco,  Sir,  won  its  way  into  Europe  by  a 
ruse — a  pretense.  It  wormed  its  way  into  the 
confidence  of  the  European  peoples  masque- 
rading as  a  medicine — a  panacea.  Introduced 
by  Francesco  Fernandez,  himself  a  renowned 
physician,  and  endorsed  by  many  other  men 
supposed  to  be  learned  in  materia  medica,  it 
was  taken  on  faith  and  retained  through  weak- 
ness. At  the  very  outset  some  of  the  wiser 
heads  saw  the  danger  of  it.  Burton  sounded  a 
note  of  warning  in  his  Anatomy  of  Melan- 
choly: "Tobacco,  divine,  rare,  superexcellent 
tobacco,  which  goes  far  beyond  all  the  pana- 
ceas, potable  gold,  and  philosopher's  stones,  is 
a  sovereign  remedy  in  all  disease.  A  good 
vomit,  I  confess,  a  virtuous  herb  if  it  be  well 
qualified,  opportunely  taken,  and  medically 


132  NEW   BROOMS 

used;  but,  as  it  is  commonly  abused  by  most 
men,  which  take  it  as  tinkers  do  ale,  'tis  a 
plague,  a  mischief,  a  violent  purge  of  goods, 
lands,  health, — hellish,  devilish,  and  damned 
tobacco,  the  ruin  and  overthrow  of  body  and 
soul." 

King  James,  of  blessed  memory,  was  not  de- 
ceived by  the  fictitious  virtues  of  this  plant, 
and  he  condemned  it  in  his  noble  work,  The 
Counterblaste.  Would  that  more  had  been  so 
blessed  with  wisdom! 

The  absurdity  of  the  extravagant  claims 
made  for  the  curative  powers  of  this  herb  is 
well  illustrated  in  the  words  of  Master  Nicho- 
las Culpepper,  author  of  The  English  Physi- 
tian,  published  so  late  as  1671 : 

"It  is  a  Martial  plant  (governed  by  Mars). 
It  is  found  by  good  experience  to  be  available 
to  expectorate  tough  Flegm  from  the  Stomach, 
Chest  and  Lungs.  .  .  .  The  seed  hereof  is 
very  effectual  to  expel  the  toothach,  &  the  ashes 
of  the  burnt  herb,  to  cleanse  the  Gums  and 
make  the  Teeth  white.  The  herb  bruised  and 


MR.    BODY    PROTESTS         133 

applied  to  the  place  grieved  by  the  Kings-Evil, 
helpeth  it  in  nine  or  ten  days  effectually. 
Manardus,  faith,  it  is  a  Counter-Poyson 
against  the  biting  of  any  Venomous  Creatures ; 
the  Herb  also  being  outwardly  applyd  to  the 
hurt  place.  The  Distilled  Water  is  often  given 
with  some  Sugar  before  the  fit  of  Ague  to 
lessen  it,  and  take  it  away  in  three  or  four  times 
using." 

Such  vaporings  were,  indeed,  as  little 
worthy  of  credence  as  the  empty  chatter  of 
OBen  Jonson's  Bobadil:  "Signer,  believe  me 
(upon  my  relation)  for  what  I  tell  you,  the 
world  shall  not  improve.  I  have  been  in  the 
Indies  (where  this  herb  grows),  where  neither 
myself  nor  a  dozen  gentlemen  more  (of  my 
knowledge)  have  received  the  taste  of  any 
other  nutriment  in  the  world,  for  the  space  of 
one  and  twenty  weeks,  but  tobacco  only. 
Therefore  it  can  not  be  but  'tis  most  divine. 
Further,  take  it  in  the  nature,  in  the  true  kind, 
so,  it  makes  an  antidote,  that  had  you  taken 
the  most  deadly  poisonous  simple  in  all  Flor- 


134  NEW    BROOMS 

ence  it  should  expel  it,  and  clarify  you  with 
as  much  ease  as  I  speak.  ...  I  do  hold  it, 
and  will  affirm  it  (before  any  Prince  in  Eu- 
rope) to  be  the  most  sovereign  and  precious 
herb  that  ever  the  earth  tendered  to  the  use  of 
man." 

Such  were  the  absurd  claims  of  those  who 
held  tobacco  to  be  a  medicine.  But  I  contend, 
Sir,  that  tobacco  has  never  been  proven  of  any 
real  medical  value  whatever ;  that  it  is  a  poison 
and  not  a  blessing.  I  have  been  told,  indeed, 
that  it  sometimes  destroys  the  toothache;  but 
for  my  own  part  I  had  rather  taste  the  tooth- 
ache than  tobacco;  and  as  for  deadening  the 
pain,  so,  for  that  matter,  will  opium  or  prussic 
acid. 

I  contend,  Sir,  that  tobacco. will  eventually 
bring  to  grief  every  nation  which  makes  use  of 
it.  Who  can  contemplate  the  present  distress- 
ing state  of  Portugal  without  recalling  that  it 
was  from  Jean  Nicot,  a  Portuguese,  that  the 
poison,  nicotine,  received  its  name? 

Tobacco  destroys  all  that  is  noble  in  man. 
There  is  no  more  noble  sentiment  than  chivalry ; 


MR.    BODY   PROTESTS        135 

and  tobacco  has  destroyed  the  chivalry  of  man. 
How  else  could  we  applaud  that  English  poet 
who  sang, 

"A  thousand  surplus  Maggies  are  waiting  to 

bear  the  yoke ; 
And  a  woman  is  only  a  woman,  but  a  good 

cigar  is  a  Smoke"? 

Tobacco  is  offensive  to  all  high-minded  peo- 
ple of  delicate  sensibilities;  it  is  offensive  to 
me.  Nay,  the  smoker  himself  sometimes  in- 
voluntarily recoils  from  his  slavery  and  feels 
disgust  for  the  vile  weed,  as  is  shown  by  the 
cry  of  the  modern  poet,  whose  name  for  the 
moment  escapes  me,  in  that  line — 

"Then,  as  you  love  me,  take  the  stubs  away!" 

Oh,  Sir,  it  is  now  high  time  for  all  men  of 
sound  judgment  and  unselfish  nature  to  unite 
in  stamping  out  this  nefarious  traffic!  Let 
every  state  pass  laws  forbidding  the  manufac- 
ture, sale  and  use  of  tobacco  in  any  form.  Let 
the  government  suppress  with  stringent  law 
and  heavy  penalty  that  wicked  and  seductive 


136  NEW   BROOMS 

book  of  J.  M.  Barrie's  called  My  Lady  Nico- 
tine; that  work  which  has,  without  doubt,  led 
many  young  men  to  contract  this  evil  habit  and 
confirmed  many  older  men  in  it  against  their 
own  better  judgment.  Let  all  books  in  praise 
of  tobacco  be  destroyed  publicly,  as  is  befitting 
a  public  menace. 

For  my  own  part,  having  suffered  all  my 
life  from  a  quinsy  which  I  contracted  early  in 
youth,  and  which  my  family  physician  assured 
me  would  be  greatly  aggravated  by  the  use  of 
tobacco,  I  have  been  saved  from  the  vile  effects 
of  even  the  slightest  contact  with  that  noxious 
plant.  But,  Sir,  being  a  man  of  tender  sensi- 
bilities and  imbued  with  an  almost  paternal 
love  of  humanity,  it  has  grieved  me  to  the  heart 
to  see  my  fellow  men  falling  ever  deeper  and 
deeper  into  the  clutches  of  this  sinful  practise. 
Owing  to  the  distress  I  suffer  from  the  fumes 
of  tobacco,  I  have  often  been  compelled  prac- 
tically to  abstain  from  the  company  of  men, 
otherwise  estimable  citizens,  who  have  con- 
tracted this  habit.  Everywhere  I  go  I  see 
young  and  old  blowing  out  their  brains  with 


MR.   BODY   PROTESTS        137 

every  puff  of  smoke,  until  I  am  sometimes 
tempted  to  blow  out  my  own  in  sheer  despair 
of  ever  making  them  see  the  evil  of  their  ways. 
And  they  smoke,  Sir,  with  such  an  air  of  in- 
nocent enjoyment  as  is  enough  to  fair  madden 
one  whose  counsel  they  scorn  and  at  whose 
warnings  they  scoff. 

I  have  been  told,  Sir,  that  you  are,  yourself, 
a  victim  of  this  evil  habit  of  tobacco  using,  and 
I  have  been  warned  that  you  will  refuse,  with 
the  infatuation  of  a  confirmed  smoker,  to  grant 
me  space  in  your  publication  for  these  honest 
and  unprejudiced  expressions  of  opinion  upon 
this  subject.  I  have  refused,  however,  to  credit 
these  scandalous  reflections  upon  your  charac- 
ter, and  I  hope  that  you  will  refute  them  and 
cause  the  utter  confusion  of  your  calumniators, 
as  well  as  help  enlighten  an  ignorant  and  mis- 
guided people,  by  printing  this  communication 
in  full. 

I  am,  Sir,  very  truly  yours, 

B.  Z.  BODY. 


ON  A  CERTAIN  CONDESCENSION  IN  FASHION 
WRITERS 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAB,  SIR:  Some  writers  have  an  unhappy 
faculty  of  adopting  a  superior  tone  which  is 
very  offensive  to  most  readers.  Even  in  a 
writer  of  acknowledged  excellence  this  dicta- 
torial style  is  a  blemish,  and,  moreover,  it  is  an 
impertinence.  Not  only  does  the  writer  assume 
to  be  superior  to  the  majority  of  his  readers, 
but,  by  implication,  to  all  the  world,  since  his 
book  is  addressed  to  mankind  at  large.  And  if 
this  air  of  condescension  is  hard  to  bear  from 
men  of  parts,  how  much  more  galling  it  is 
when  we  suffer  it  at  the  hands  of  insolent  no- 
bodies— writers  who  seek  to  hide  their  obscur- 
ity behind  the  shield  of  an  imposing  pseudo- 
nym. I  have  in  mind,  Sir,  that  pestiferous 
crew  who  mar  the  pages  of  our  theater  pro- 
grams with  their  uninvited  discourses  upon 
men's  fashions. 

138 


FASHION    WRITERS  139 

It  may  be  that  I  am  confessing  to  an  un- 
manly weakness  when  I  confess  that  I  invari- 
ably peruse  that  column  in  my  program  which 
is  signed  Beau  Nash,,  Beau  Brummel,  or  some- 
thing equally  ridiculous;  but  if  it  is  a  weak- 
ness, I  am  convinced  that  it  is  one  which  is 
shared  by  nine  out  of  ten  men  in  the  audience. 
I  say  I  am  convinced,  because,  suspecting  that 
I  might  be  alone  in  it,  I  took  the  trouble  to 
observe  the  men  about  me  upon  several  occa- 
sions, and  I  always  caught  them  at  it  at  some 
time  during  the  intermissions.  They  read  it 
furtively,  to  be  sure,  but  they  read  it  none  the 
less.  Of  course,  I  can  not  be  sure  what  effect 
these  essays  upon  sartorial  matters  have  upon 
others,  but  I  fancy  they  are  affected  much  as  I 
am,  and  for  my  part  they  distress  me  exceed- 
ingly. 

In  the  first  place,  I  am  not  overly  pleased 
that  some  unknown  hack  writer  has  assumed  to 
instruct  me  in  such  a  personal  matter  as  the 
clothes  which  I  put  upon  my  back,  and  in  the 
second  place,  I  strongly  resent  the  implication 
that  I  am  interested  in  such  foppish  literature. 


140  NEW   BROOMS 

But,  what  is  worse  than  all  else,  these  anony*- 
mous  arbiters  of  dress  are  continually  putting 
me  out  of  countenance  by  criticizing  explicitly 
and  in  detail  the  very  clothes  that  I  have  on! 
It  seems  to  me  that  these  fellows  have  a  devilish 
faculty  of  knowing  beforehand  just  what  I 
shall  be  wearing  every  season. 

Now,  Mr.  Idler,  you  must  not  suppose  that 
I  am  one  of  those  silly  fellows  who  aspire  to 
lead  the  fashion  or  to  play  the  dandy,  for,  in- 
deed, I  am  nothing  of  the  sort.  I  do  not  be- 
lieve there  is  a  man  living  who  more  heartily 
despises  those  empty-headed  creatures  who  are 
variously  known  as  fops,  dudes  and  dandies. 
It  has  never  been  my  ambition  to  be  the  intro- 
ducer of  a  new  style  of  neckwear  or  footgear; 
indeed,  I  fear  my  very  indifference  to  such 
matters  lays  me  open  to  the  vexation  caused  by 
these  miserable  scribblers  who  prey  upon  my 
peace  of  mind.  Were  I  in  the  habit  of  con- 
sulting long  and  earnestly  with  my  tailor  and 
haberdasher,  no  doubt  I  should  be  fortified  with 
a  sound  and  sure  confidence  in  the  appropriate- 
ness of  my  apparel.  But  the  fact  is,  I  leave 


FASHION    WRITERS  141 

these  things  largely  to  the  men  who  make  a 
business  of  them,  and  content  myself  with 
choosing  what  seems  to  me  to  be  sufficiently 
modish  and  yet  in  good  taste. 

And  yet,  Sir,  though  I  am  no  macaroni,  I 
am  not  utterly  indifferent  to  my  personal  ap- 
pearance. If  I  am  not  a  fop,  neither  am  I  a 
sloven.  I  am  one  of  those  who  have  faith  in 
the  old  saying,  In  media  tutissimus  ibis.  I 
would  not  be 

"The  first  by  whom  the  new  are  tried, 
Nor  yet  the  last  to  lay  the  old  aside." 

Like  most  practical  men,  I  have  a  positive 
horror  of  appearing  queer.  I  shun  eccentricity 
in  dress  as  assiduously  as  I  shun  eccentricity  in 
manners.  I  sometimes  envy  poets  and  artists, 
not  for  their  poetry  or  their  art,  but  for  that 
sublime  egotism  which  enables  them  to  take 
pleasure  in  making  themselves  ridiculous.  This 
seems  to  me  a  vanity  which  is  almost  beautiful, 
a  self-confidence  which  is  a  greater  blessing 
than  personal  bravery.  Many  a  man,  other- 


142  NEW   BROOMS 

wise  not  extraordinary,  may  prove  himself  a 
hero  of  physical  courage  when  the  occasion  of- 
fers, but  few  there  are  who  can  deliberately 
challenge  attention  by  their  freakish  appear- 
ance and  go  out  among  their  fellow  men  with 
an  air  which  seems  to  say,  "I  know  I  look  like 
the  devil  and  I  am  proud  of  it." 

Now  I,  Sir — I  should  not  be  proud  of  it.  I 
should  be  miserably  ashamed.  And  so  I  am 
ashamed  when  I  read  in  my  program  that 
which  brands  me  as  a  man  of  no  taste  or  dis- 
crimination. I  am  horribly  humiliated  when  I 
discover  in  the  column  of  Beau  Nash  that  I 
have  brazenly  shattered  every  commandment  in 
the  sartorial  decalogue.  I  give  you  my  word, 
Sir,  I  break  into  a  cold  perspiration  whenever 
I  recall  the  harrowing  experience  I  had  last 
Saturday-week.  It  so  happened  that  when  I 
prepared  to  go  to  the  play,  I  found  no  fresh 
white  waistcoats.  This  did  not  greatly  trouble 
me  at  the  time,  for  I  am  a  resourceful  man, 
and  I  at  once  recalled  that  I  possessed  a  black 
waistcoat  which  my  tailor  had  made  for  me  at 
the  same  time  he  had  made  my  dress  suit.  This 


FASHION    WRITERS  143 

I  donned  in  blissful  ignorance  of  my  impend- 
ing ordeal.  I  arrived  at  the  theater  rather  late 
and  had  no  opportunity  of  reading  the  pro- 
gram before  the  curtain  rose.  That  first  act  is 
the  one  bright  memory  I  have  of  that  awful 
evening.  I  enjoyed  the  first  act.  But,  Sir,  I 
did  not  long  remain  in  ignorance  of  my  dis- 
grace. In  the  first  intermission  my  eyes  were 
drawn  by  an  irresistible  fascination  to  the  col- 
umn headed,  "What  Men  Wear,"  and  in  let- 
ters which  seemed  fairly  to  jump  out  of  the 
page  I  read,  "The  black  waistcoat  worn  with 
evening  dress  is  the  height  of  vulgarity  and  is 
not  tolerated" 

Sir,  you  can  imagine  with  what  a  sudden 
shock  my  care-free  contentment  dropped  from 
me.  There  I  sat  in  the  full  glare  of  the  electric 
light,  conscious  that  I  was  surrounded  by  hun- 
dreds of  men  who  had  read  that  damning  para- 
graph which  stamped  me  as  an  ignorant  under- 
bred boor,  who  had  attempted  evening  dress 
without  knowing  the  very  rudiments  of  the  art. 
I  cast  a  hasty  glance  about  the  theater,  and  the 
fleeting  hope  which  had  sprung  up  died  within 


144  NEW   BROOMS 

my  breast.  There  was  not  another  black  waist- 
coat in  sight. 

How  I  lived  through  the  rest  of  that  inter- 
mission I  can  not  say.  I  only  know  that  I  could 
feel  the  contemptuous  eyes  of  the  audience 
upon  that  dreadful  black  waistcoat,  like  so 
many  hot  augurs  boring  holes  in  the  pit  of  my 
stomach.  Hastily  hiding  my  face  behind  my 
program,  I  slumped  down  in  my  seat  in  the 
vain  hope  of  hiding  my  disgrace,  while  drops 
of  anguish  trickled  down  my  brow  and  fell 
splashing  upon  the  cruel  words  which  had  ren- 
dered me  an  object  for  pity  and  contempt. 
When  the  curtain  rose  upon  the  second  act,  I 
crept  out  of  the  auditorium  under  cover  of  the 
kindly  darkness  and  slunk  away  home  to  hide 
my  shame. 

I  do  not  think  I  shall  ever  attend  the  theater 
in  this  city  again.  In  vain  I  argue  and  seek  to 
persuade  myself  that  what  I  read  in  the  pro- 
gram was  only  the  opinion  of  one  man,  and  a 
man  at  that  who,  in  all  probability,  never 
owned  a  dress  suit  in  his  life.  Whoever  he  may 
be,  whatever  his  knowledge  or  ignorance  of 


FASHION    WRITERS  145 

dress  may  be,  he  writes  with  such  a  saucy  as- 
sumption of  omniscient  authority  that  my  rea- 
son stands  abashed  before  his  insolence.  As 
aloof  and  austere  as  the  Olympian  gods,  he 
crushes  my  spirit  and  fills  my  soul  with  humil- 
ity. No,  Mr.  Idler,  I  do  not  believe  I  shall  ever 
attend  the  theater  here  again.  The  mental  suf- 
fering these  fashion  writers  inflict  upon  me  is 
too  great  a  price  to  pay  for  the  pleasure  I  ex- 
tract from  the  drama. 

I  am,  Sir, 

MAURICE  MUFTI. 


OF  LOOKING  BACKWARD 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  It  is  a  constant  source  of  sur- 
prise to  me  that  men  continue,  at  all  ages  but 
the  earliest,  to  look  back  upon  the  past  with  a 
wistful  eye,  recalling,  with  many  expressions 
of  regret,  the  days  that  are  no  more.  Thus, 
while  still  in  the  twenties,  the  youth  begins  to 
feel  the  burden  of  worldly  cares  already  press- 
ing heavily  upon  his  shoulders  and  sighs  when 
he  thinks  of  the  irresponsible  school-days  of  his 
teens.  At  thirty,  he  is  convinced  that  he  has 
missed  the  best  part  of  his  youth  and  would 
fain  be  a  youngster  of  twenty  once  more,  his 
greatest  care  the  sprouting  down  upon  his  up- 
per lip.  Come  to  forty,  he  is  sure  that  he  should 
have  been  most  happy  when  thirty,  over  the 
first  rawness  of  youth,  but  not  yet  sensible  of 
any  physical  deterioration  and  quite  unmarked 
by  the  passage  of  time.  At  fifty,  he  envies  the 

146 


OF    LOOKING   BACKWARD    147 

lustihood  of  forty,  and  at  sixty  he  longs  for  the 
activity  and  the  muscular  ease  which  he  en- 
joyed at  fifty.  And  so  it  goes  on,  so  that  we 
can  readily  imagine  a  patriarch  of  ancient  days 
exclaiming,  "Oh,  if  I  were  but  two-hundred- 
and-twenty  once  more!  How  I  should  enjoy 
life!" 

Now,  to  me,  Mr.  Idler,  things  do  not  appear 
in  this  light  at  all.  I  can  not  conceive  that  had 
I  been  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  Emperor  of 
France,  I  should  have  longed  to  be  an  obscure 
youth  in  Corsica.  It  is  easier,  of  course,  to 
understand  why  he  might,  at  St.  Helena,  re- 
gret the  departed  glories  of  St.  Cloud ;  but  for 
myself,  I  do  not  believe  I  should  ever,  what- 
ever my  former  station  might  have  been,  wish 
to  lay  down  the  present  for  the  past.  I  have, 
it  is  true,  some  hope  for  the  future  (I  am  now 
but  fifty) ,  but  even  if  this  were  denied  me,  and 
I  were  assured  that  my  condition  ten  years 
hence  would  be  no  more  enviable  than  it  is  at 
present,  yet  I  think  I  should  not  care  to  reas- 
sume  my  youthful  aspect,  or  to  take  up  my 
life  where  I  left  it  long  ago. 


148  NEW   BROOMS 

There  is,  in  truth,  no  period  of  my  past  life 
upon  which  I  can  look  back  with  complete 
complacency.  I  was,  at  all  times,  very  well 
satisfied  with  myself,  barring1  occasional  and 
inevitable  spasms  of  self-reproach.  I  am,  to 
say  the  truth,  well  enough  satisfied  with  my- 
self as  I  am  to-day.  But  experience  has  taught 
me  that  the  time  will  come  when  I  shall  look 
back  upon  to-day  and  will  not  be  pleased  with 
my  present  self  at  all.  At  thirty  I  remembered 
the  Me  of  twenty  as  a  callow  and  conceited  boy. 
At  forty  I  beheld  in  the  Me  of  ten  years  gone 
a  lazy  careless  idler.  At  fifty  I  recollected  the 
man  of  forty  as  a  pompous  and  affected  ass. 
Now,  while  the  most  careful  scrutiny  of  my 
person  and  character  fails  to  reveal  to  me,  at 
this  time,  any  serious  flaw  or  defect,  yet  I 
doubt  not  that  the  future  Me,  the  Me  of  Sixty, 
will  have  grave  fault  to  find  with  the  individual 
who  is  inhabiting  my  skin  at  the  present  mo- 
ment. 

"We  live  and  learn,"  says  the  proverb,  and 
since  we  do,  it  is  unnatural  if  we  do  not  feel  a 
sort  of  shame  in  the  ignorance  of  our  former 


OF    LOOKING   BACKWARD    149 

selves.  I  feel  no  shame  for  my  present  igno- 
rance because  I  do  not  know  wherein  that  ig- 
norance consists,  but  be  assured  I  shall,  as  soon 
as  I  have  found  myself  out. 

It  is,  I  like  to  think,  one  of  the  wisest  provi- 
sions of  a  merciful  God  that  no  man  is  ever 
permitted  to  see  what  a  consummate  simpleton 
he  is,  but  only  what  a  simpleton  he  has  been. 
A  complete  and  certain  revelation  of  a  man's 
folly  to  himself  would,  without  a  doubt,  result 
in  an  immediate  and  lasting  loss  of  self-respect. 
And  to  lose  one's  self-respect  is  to  lose  one's 
identity  and  become  a  stranger  to  one's  self. 
The  inmost  mind,  however  the  outward  actions 
of  the  body  may  seem  to  contradict  it,  still 
clings  to  the  noblest  principles,  so  that  no  man 
can  be  truly  said  to  be  unprincipled.  He  may 
be  debauched  and  depraved,  but  he  is  not  with- 
out principle  so  long  as  his  subconscious  per- 
sonality has  the  power  to  arise  and  accuse  his 
conscious  person.  Where  there  is  no  such  ac- 
cusation there  can  be  no  loss  of  self-respect, 
for  surely  a  man  must  possess  a  thing  before  he 
can  lose  it.  As  some  say  of  another,  "He  is  his 


150  NEW   BROOMS 

own  worst  enemy,"  so  it  may  be  said  that  every 
man  should  be  his  own  best  friend.  None  other 
is  empowered  so  to  befriend  him.  His  life  and 
his  character  must  be,  to  a  very  great  extent, 
of  his  own  making,  for  every  man  truly  lives 
to  himself.  He  is  the  central  character  of  the 
drama  in  which  he  is  both  actor  and  spectator. 
Others  may  come  and  go,  but  he  alone  remains 
throughout  the  play. 

For  all  our  intimacy  with  ourselves,  we  never 
come  to  know  ourselves  completely.  We  dis- 
cover, day  by  day,  ideas  and  opinions  which 
we  never  suspected  ourselves  of  possessing. 
We  are  wrung  by  emotions  which  take  us  com- 
pletely by  surprise.  We  are  angered  by  slights 
which  our  reason  tells  us  are  beneath  our  notice. 
We  are  moved  to  compassion  when  we  are  most 
determined  to  remain  firm  and  unmoved.  We 
take  a  liking  for  this  person  whom  we  have  de- 
cided to  ^dislike,  and  we  develop  an  inexplicable 
aversion  for  another  whom  we  have  deliber- 
ately chosen  for  a  friend.  Whence  come  these 
impulses,  these  orders  which  we  can  not  dis- 
obey? These  commands  which  override  our 


OF    LOOKING   BACKWARD    151 

conscious  desires  and  break  down  our  natural 
wills?  Where,  indeed,  but  from  that  Inner 
Man,  that  Unknown  Self  whose  power  we  feel 
but  can  not  comprehend  ?  Where  else  but  from 
that  second  and  stronger,  if  submerged,  per- 
sonality— the  human  soul?  Is  it  not,  indeed, 
this  unanswerable  argument,  this  inexplicable 
conviction  of  another  and  better-  Self  within, 
joined  with  and  yet  distinct  from,  the  ordinary 
self,  which  persuades  men  that  mankind  is 
immortal,  no  matter  how  ably  the  Brain  may 
play  the  Infidel,  nor  how  aptly  the  Tongue 
may  second  him? 

For  our  outward  selves,  our  "every-day 
selves,"  as  we  might  say,  we  know  whence  they 
are  derived.  We  know  that  we  are  born  of 
woman  and  fathered  of  man.  We  can  trace  to 
the  one  or  the  other  this  feature  or  that,  this 
trait  or  the  other,  but  there  are  yet  to  be  ac- 
counted for  those  strange  whims  and  fancies, 
those  impulses  and  ideals  which  come  neither 
from  the  father  nor  the  mother,  and  which,  in 
very  truth,  make  us  ourselves,  make  us  to  be 
different  from  our  sisters  and  our  brothers, 


152  NEW   BROOMS 

and  without  which  all  the  offspring  of  the  same 
parents  would  be  as  like  as  so  many  peas  in  a 
pod.  And  it  is  these  things  which  convince  us 
that  we  have  within  us  another  Ego,  another 
Self  which  comes  to  us  from  some  unknown 
place,  to  guard  and  to  guide  us  upon  the  peril- 
ous path  of  life.  We  may  sometimes  close  our 
ears  to  his  counsel,  but  he  never  suffers  us  to 
go  wrong  unadvised.  Is  it  to  be  wondered  at, 
then,  that  we  grow  to  feel  for  ourselves  an  af- 
fection which  is  not  wholly  selfish,  and  to  take 
in  ourselves  a  pride  which  is  not  wholly  ego- 
tistic? I  do  not  feel  under  any  obligation  to 
the  man  who  wears  my  face  and  bears  my 
name ;  he  has  made  me  ridiculous  too  often  for 
that.  But  I  do  feel  a  duty  to  that  other  Me, 
the  Me  that  is  not  wholly  of  my  own  choosing. 
And  so,  I  am  convinced,  do  most  men. 

As  I  was  saying,  or  about  to  say,  the  keenest 
shame  we  ever  feel  is  the  shame  we  feel  for 
ourselves.  Shame  for  others  may  be  tempered 
with  forgiveness,  but  it  is  very  difficult  to  for- 
give one's  self.  There  is  no  question  there  of 
giving  the  accused  the  benefit  of  the  doubt. 


OF    LOOKING   BACKWARD    153 

There  is  no  doubt.  I  feel  a  certain  shame  for 
the  young  man  that  I  once  was  because  I  nat- 
urally feel  a  tenderness  for  him.  I  can  forgive 
him  much  more  readily  than  I  could  forgive 
myself  as  I  am  to-day.  Yet  I  would  not,  if  I 
could,  change  places  with  him.  My  taste  in 
Selves,  as  in  other  things,  has  changed  as  I 
have  grown  older.  I  blush  for  the  weak-mind- 
edness of  that  youth  who  was  the  Me  of  twenty 
years  ago ;  yet  I  feel,  in  a  way,  relieved  from 
the  sense  of  direct  responsibility,  for  am  I  not, 
in  fact,  another  and  a  different  person  from 
the  man  I  was? 

As  the  delightful  Holmes  once  expressed  it, 
that  youthful  self  is  like  a  son  to  me.  A  bit  of 
a  cub,  but  on  the  whole,  not  at  all  a  bad  fellow. 
He  is  related  to  me,  but  he  is  not  me.  And  he 
never  was  the  man  that  I  now  am.  He  wore  my 
body  for  a  time,  that  was  all.  We  were  never 
the  same,  for  I  was  not  born  until  he  had  ceased 
to  be.  I  am  no  more  that  young  man  of  twenty 
years  ago  than  I  am  that  other  young  man  who 
interrupts  me  now — (No,  I  haven't.  Can't  you 
see  I'm  busy?) — to  borrow  a  match  to  set  his 


154  NEW   BROOMS 

ugly  bulldog  pipe  alight.  A  vile  habit — pipe- 
smoking  !  Unsanitary  and  beastly  annoying  to 
those  who  have  better  sense.  That  young  man 
we  were  speaking  of — not  the  one  who  asked 
for  the  match,  you  know,  but  the  one  who  had 
the  impudence  to  pass  himself  off  for  me 
twenty  years  ago — he  used  to  smoke  a  bulldog 
pipe.  I  stopped  it  some  time  ago  myself.  Bad 
for  the  heart,  the  doctor  said,  and — well,  I'm 
getting  on  and  I  can  see  for  myself  the  folly 
of  it.  Decidedly,  I  should  not  like  to  exchange 
my  own  calm  judgment  for  his  youthful  care- 
lessness and  addiction  to  tobacco.  Unless — 
well,  say,  unless  for  twenty  minutes  after 
dinner! 

I  am,  Sir, 

OLIVER  OLDFELLOW. 


THE  LITERARY  LIFE 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  have  read  a  great  many  refer- 
ences, at  one  time  or  another,  to  something 
which  is  known  as  "the  literary  life".  I  have 
read  of  it  in  novels,  in  essays,  in  criticisms  and 
in  the  reports  of  the  daily  newspapers.  Every- 
body seems  to  know  of  it,  and  everybody  speaks 
of  it  as  of  something  to  be  taken  for  granted ; 
but  though  I  have  made  an  earnest  effort  to 
discover  just  what  it  is  and  where  and  by  whom 
it  is  lived,  I  have  been  quite  unable  to  do  so. 
I  had  been  a  newspaper  writer  for  several 
years  when  I  first  began  to  take  an  interest  in 
this  curiously  illusive  sort  of  existence.  It  was 
in  a  novel,  I  think,  that  I  had  read  it  upon  the 
occasion  when  my  curiosity  aroused  me  to  ac- 
tion. "There  it  is  again,"  I  said  to  myself. 
"What  is  this  literary  life,  anyway?  Who  lives 
it  and  in  what  does  the  living  of  it  consist? 

155 


156  NEW   BROOMS 

How  does  one  go  about  finding  out  the  secret 
of  it?" 

So  I  set  out  on  my  quest.  As  all  good  re- 
porters should  do,  I  first  took  stock  of  my  pos- 
sible sources  of  information,  and  having  done 
so,  I  did  what  reporters  usually  do  when  they 
wish  to  find  out  anything — I  asked  the  city 
editor. 

"How  the  devil  do  I  know?"  said  he  in  his 
unliterary  way.  "You're  a  reporter,  ain't  you? 
Get  busy  and  find  out.  If  you  get  anything 
worth  writing,  make  a  story  of  it."  That  is  the 
way  with  city  editors ;  they  have  no  thought  for 
anything  but  "stories",  no  thirst  for  knowl- 
edge that  is  not  in  the  way  of  business,  no  soul 
for  the  higher  things  in  life. 

With  this  source  of  information  closed  to 
me,  I  turned  to  the  staff.  I  knew  I  could  learn 
nothing  from  the  books  where  I  had  found  the 
term  used.  The  books  merely  referred  to  "lit- 
erary life"  just  as  we  say  "prison  life"  or 
"army  life"  and  expect  every  one  to  understand 
what  we  mean.  The  first  man  I  asked  about  it 
simply  laughed  and  said,  "That's  a  good  one!" 


THE    LITERARY   LIFE        157 

The  second  man  told  me  to  go  away  and  stop 
bothering  him.  He  was  writing  an  interesting 
article  about  the  price  of  onions.  The  third 
man  asked  me  if  I  thought  I  was  funny.  That 
nearly  discouraged  me.  I  tried  one  or  two 
others  without  success,  and  then  I  determined 
to  try  a  more  subtle  method  of  investigation. 
I  had  failed  to  gather  my  desired  informa- 
tion as  a  reporter ;  I  would  try  my  hand  as  a  de- 
tective. I  took  to  following  the  members  of  the 
staff  home  from  the  office.  It  was  an  afternoon 
newspaper  and  that  was  easy  to  do.  The  result 
of  my  shadowing  was  that  I  learned  much  of 
the  habits  of  these  men,  but  little  of  what  I 
wanted  to  know.  The  police  reporter  went 
from  the  office  direct  to  the  butcher  shop. 
There  he  made  a  purchase  which  he  tucked  un- 
der his  arm  and  went  home.  He  stayed  at  home 
every  night  that  I  watched  him.  The  court  re- 
porter spent  his  evenings  in  a  little  saloon  on 
a  side  street  playing  poker  with  a  particular 
friend  of  his  who  was  a  boilermaker.  The  hotel 
reporter  covered  the  same  ground  every  even- 
ing that  he  had  covered  during  the  day.  He 


158  NEW   BROOMS 

went  from  one  hotel  to  another,  playing  pool 
or  billiards  and  shaking  dice  with  traveling 
men.  After  about  a  fortnight  of  investigation 
I  gave  up  trying  to  learn  anything  about  the 
literary  life  from  newspaper  men.  I  looked 
up  a  few  magazine  writers  and  the  result  was 
the  same :  No  two  of  these  men  lived  the  same 
life  at  all! 

I  was  astonished.  I  asked  myself  how  it 
came  about  that  these  men  had  overlooked  their 
obvious  duty  of  living  the  literary  life.  If  lit- 
erary men  knew  nothing  of  the  literary  life, 
then  who  would?  I  resolved  that  I  would  solve 
that  problem  if  it  took  me  a  year.  From  the 
magazine  writers  I  went  on  to  the  novelists 
who  seemed  to  have  even  less  in  common  than 
the  two  former  classes  had.  The  publishers 
were  so  widely  scattered  in  so  many  different 
suburbs  that  I  had  not  the  courage  to  seek 
them  out. 

After  a  conscientious  search  which  covered 
a  period  of  six  months  or  more,  I  began  to 
think  that  the  literary  life  might  be  one  of  those 
traditions  handed  down  from  another  age ;  one 


THE    LITERARY    LIFE        159 

of  those  things  which  continue  to  be  spoken  of 
in  books  long  after  they  cease  to  have  any  real 
existence.  Perhaps  the  authors  of  other  days 
had  lived  the  literary  life,  even  if  the  authors 
of  my  own  time  did  not.  I  would  see.  I  began 
to  read  biography.  In  Johnson's  Lives  of  the 
Poets  I  found  that: 

Abraham  Cowley  was  the  son  of  a  grocer. 
He  showed  early  signs  of  genius;  he  was  ex- 
pelled from  Cambridge.  He  was,  for  a  time, 
private  secretary  to  Lord  Falkland.  After- 
ward he  spent  some  time  in  jail  as  a  political 
prisoner.  Upon  emerging  from  prison  he  be- 
came a  doctor,  and  thinking  a  knowledge  of 
botany  necessary  to  one  of  his  profession,  he 
retired  into  the  country  to  study  that  science. 
For  some  reason,  he  abandoned  botany  for  po- 
etry and  from  that  time  on  he  wrote  poetry. 
He  died  peacefully  of  rheumatism. 

Edmund  Waller  was  the  son  of  a  country 
gentleman.  He  attended  Cambridge  and  was 
sent  to  Parliament  before  he  was  twenty.  Rich 
by  birth,  he  added  to  his  wealth  by  marrying 
an  heiress  who  died  young  and  left  him  free 


160  NEW   BROOMS 

to  marry  again,  which  he  did.  He  lived  among 
people  of  fashion  and  wealth,  and  though  he 
was  sent  into  exile  for  a  short  time  because  of 
a  treasonable  conspiracy  in  which  he  engaged, 
he  was  soon  restored  to  general  favor.  He  died 
in  good  circumstances  of  old  age. 

Thomas  Otway  was  the  son  of  a  rector.  He 
left  college  without  a  degree.  He  went  into 
gay  society  and  mingled  his  literary  labor  with 
dissipation.  He  was,  for  a  short  time,  an  officer 
in  the  army.  He  fell  upon  evil  days,  and  when 
threatened  with  starvation,  borrowed  a  guinea 
from  a  total  stranger.  With  this  he  bought 
himself  a  roll,  but  he  was  so  ravenous  that  he 
attempted  to  bolt  it  at  one  mouthful  and  so 
choked  himself  to  death. 

Which  one  of  these  men  might  properly  be 
said  to  have  led  the  literary  life? 

You  need  not  be  surprised  to  find  in  your 
paper  some  morning  an  advertisement  to  this 
effect:  "Wanted — Some  definite  information 
concerning  the  character  and  habitat  of  the 
Literary  Life."  But  if  you  know  anything 
about  it,  don't  wait  for  the  advertisement,  but 


THE    LITERARY   LIFE        161 

send  on  your  information  at  once.    I  think 
maybe  I  would  be  willing  to  try  it  myself. 
Certainly  somebody  ought  to  live  it. 
I  am,  Sir, 

A.  J.  PENN. 


THE  POETIC  LICENSE 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAE  SIR:  Your  recent  strictures  upon  a 
certain  poem  by  John  Masefield,  and  the  gen- 
eral tenor  of  several  other  volumes  of  verse 
recently  published,  have  moved  me  to  address 
you  upon  a  subject  which  holds  considerable 
interest  for  me ;  and  that,  Sir,  is  the  scope  and 
legitimacy  of  what  is  commonly  called  "the 
poetic  license".  To  what  does  this  license  ex- 
tend and  by  whom  is  it  granted?  Is  there  no 
way  in  which  it  may  be  regulated  by  law? 

This  matter  of  the  poetic  license  is  a  source 
of  continual  annoyance  to  me.  I  find  it  invoked 
upon  all  occasions.  I  find  that  it  is  considered  a 
sufficient  answer  to  any  criticisms  or  charges 
that  may  be  brought  against  a  poet.  I  am  curi- 
ous to  know  if  there  is  any  real  authority  for 
it ;  if  it  is  not,  in  fact,  a  mere  figment  of  the  im- 

162 


THE    POETIC    LICENSE       163 

agination,  a  polite  fiction  of  letters  invented  by 
men  of  letters  for  the  purpose  of  confounding 
the  layman  and  depriving  him  of  his  natural 
right  to  pass  an  opinion  upon  all  that  he  reads  ? 
I  confess  I  am  no  poet.  This  being  so,  I  may 
be  lacking  in  sympathy  for  the  art,  as  some  of 
my  poetic  acquaintances  have  averred.  But  I 
protest  that  a  man  need  not  be  a  poet  to  be  a 
judge  of  poetry,  any  more  than  he  need  be  a 
vintner  to  be  a  judge  of  wines,  or  a  cook  to 
be  a  judge  of  preserves.  I  may  lack  the  finer 
ear  of  the  poet  when  it  comes  to  a  question  of 
complicated  rhythms,  but  I  am  not  lacking  in 
an  elementary  knowledge  of  grammar,  as  some 
of  our  poets  appear  to  be.  I  never  could  see 
any  reason  why  a  poet's  grammatical  or  or- 
thographical errors  should  be  condoned  merely 
because  he  chooses  to  write  in  verse.  We  do 
not  condone  such  defects  in  a  prose  writer,  why 
then  in  a  poet?  It  may  be  urged  that  the  poet 
has  a  harder  task  than  the  prose  writer;  that  it 
is  more  difficult  to  express  one's  self  in  verse 
than  in  prose.  No  doubt  it  is,  but  is  that  any 
reason  why  incompetent  writers  should  be  ex- 


164  NEW   BROOMS 

cused  their  errors?  Or  their  laxness?  Or  their 
laziness?  Why  write  poetry  at  all  if  they  can 
not  write  it  properly?  Why  not  choose  prose 
for  a  medium  ?  There  are  men,  no  doubt,  who 
find  prose  as  difficult  as  most  men  find  poetry, 
but  do  we  therefore  overlook  their  mistakes  or 
their  vagaries? 

Sir,  it  appears  to  me  that  the  leniency  shown 
to  verse  writers  in  this  respect  has  worked  a 
great  injury  to  the  art  of  poetry.  It  has  en- 
couraged men  to  write  verses,  who  were  in  no 
way  fitted  to  write  verses.  It  has  led  tyros  to 
choose  poetry  rather  than  prose  because  ki  the 
former  they  feel  more  secure  from  the  well- 
merited  censure  of  their  readers.  It  has  de- 
graded really  good  poetry  to  the  level  of  very 
poor  poetry  by  allowing  virtue  where  there  was 
none  and  by  holding  verses  full  of  defects  to 
be  equal  in  merit  with  verses  marred  by  no  such 
violations  of  the  common  rules  of  grammar 
and  orthography. 

All  this,  Sir,  was  bad  enough,  but  I  was  pre- 
pared to  pass  over  it  since  it  is  a  practise  in- 


THE    POETIC    LICENSE       165 

augurated  and  upheld  by  professional  critics 
who  will  allow  us  laymen  no  word  at  all  in  the 
matter.  But,  Sir,  when  these  poets  attempt  to 
extend  their  poetic  license  to  clothing,  to  man- 
ners and  to  morals,  I  think  they  go  too  far. 

Not  long  since,  I  ventured  some  remarks, 
not  altogether  complimentary,  upon  the  per- 
sonal appearance  of  a  certain  poet,  or  poet- 
aster, as  I  prefer  to  call  him,  in  the  presence  of 
a  literary  woman.  "Oh,  yes,"  she  replied. 
"There's  no  denying  it — he  is  a  sloven.  But 
really  one  of  his  spirituality  could  hardly  be 
expected  to  be  finicky  about  his  clothing  and 
that  sort  of  thing."  Upon  another  occasion,  I 
spoke  harshly  with  regard  to  the  manners  of  a 
well-known  versifier,  and  I  was  rebuked  for 
my  hasty  judgment  with  the  assurance  that  the 
oddity  of  his  conduct  ought  not  to  be  ascribed 
to  boorishness  or  rudeness,  but  to  his  poetic 
temperament.  And,  Sir,  only  yesterday,  when 
I  condemned  the  unbridled  license  and  immor- 
ality of  a  recent  book  of  poetry,  I  was  in- 
formed that  a  poet  could  not  be  expected  to 


166  NEW   BROOMS 

view  a  moral  question  from  the  same  angle  as 
an  ordinary  uninspired  mortal. 

Sir,  if  these  scribblers  of  verse  are  to  be  al- 
lowed any  license,  why  should  they  not  qualify 
for  it  as  do  pedlers,  saloon-keepers  and  the  like  ? 
Why  not  require  them  to  prove  their  fitness  for 
the  business  of  writing  poetry?  Let  them  se- 
cure their  license  from  the  civil  authorities,  and 
let  those  licenses  be  revoked  at  the  first  indica- 
tion of  abuse  of  privilege. 

As  affairs  now  stand,  any  one  who  chances 
to  possess  a  pen,  a  windsor  tie  and  a  wide- 
awake hat  can  pass  himself  off  for  a  poet  and 
can  claim  indulgence  for  his  bad  verse,  bad 
manners  and  bad  morals  upon  the  plea  of  po- 
etic temperament.  Therefore,  to  insure  the 
public  against  such  imposture,  I  suggest  that 
every  poet  be  compelled,  like  every  chauffeur, 
to  wear  his  license  in  a  conspicuous  place,  and 
that  if  he  fail  to  comply  with  this  requirement, 
he  be  immediately  impounded. 

This  arrangement,  I  think,  would  operate  as 
an  effective  check  upon  the  too  exuberant  po- 
etic temperament,  and  would  also  be  an  excel- 


THE    POETIC    LICENSE       167 

lent  thing  for  the  public,  for,  Sir,  if  every  poet 
were  required,  like  every  dog",  to  wear  his  li- 
cense attached  to  a  collar,  the  pound  would 
soon  be  full  of  poets. 

I  am,  Sir, 

P.  ROSE. 


THE  NECESSITY  FOR  BEGGARS 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  It  is  with  alarm  that  I  observe 
the  increasing  activity  of  our  charitable  or- 
ganizations and  the  consequent  disappearance 
of  beggars  from  our  city  streets.  I,  who  was 
formerly  constantly  importuned  for  alms 
whenever  I  stirred  abroad,  have  not  now  been 
approached  by  one  of  those  needy  tatterde- 
malions for  a  period  of  six  months  or  more. 
This  fact  has,  for  me,  a  deep  significance.  It 
means  nothing  less  than  that  the  ancient  fra- 
ternity of  street  beggars  is  rapidly  dying  out. 
Surely  you  must  have  noticed  that  yourself. 
Where  are  the  old  blue-spectacled  men  one 
used  to  see  standing  upon  the  corners,  bearing 
the  once-familiar  placard,  "I  am  Blind"? 
Where  are  the  legless  men  who  used  to  wring 
discords  from  little  squatty  hand-organs? 
Where  are  the  street-singers,  the  match  ven- 

168 


BEGGARS  169 

ders,  the  orphans,  the  lost  children,  the  para- 
lytics? Where,  even,  is  the  Italian  organ- 
grinder  with  his  begging  monkey?  These 
charitable  organizations,  Sir,  have  spirited 
them  away,  and  now  instead  of  being  ap- 
proached by  the  beggars  themselves,  we  are 
visited  by  the  agents  of  the  societies. 

Now,  Sir,  my  regret  at  the  passing  of  the 
beggar  is  not  altogether  sentimental,  like 
Charles  Lamb's  complaint  in  The  Decay  of 
Beggars  in  the  Metropolis.  There  may  be  a 
certain  amount  of  sentiment  in  it,  for  certainly 
in  the  loss  of  beggars  we  not  only  lose  a  pic- 
turesque class  of  people,  but  we  also  suffer  a 
spiritual  loss.  The  spiritual  glow  which  came 
of  personal  giving  is  entirely,  or  almost  en- 
tirely, absent  in  making  checks  for  these  beg- 
gars by  proxy.  But,  Sir,  I  am  a  practical  man 
and  I  can  plainly  see  that  the  beggar,  so  far 
from  being  a  mere  nuisance  and  eyesore,  as 
charity-workers  would  have  you  believe,  is  a 
very  useful  and  necessary  member  of  the  so- 
cial order. 

Beggars,  Mr.  Idler,  are  the  natural  scaven- 


170  NEW   BROOMS 

gers  of  the  human  race.  They  live  upon  the 
scraps  we  throw  from  our  tables ;  they  dress  in 
our  cast-off  garments.  In  short,  Sir,  they  make 
to  serve  a  useful  purpose,  that  which  would 
otherwise  be  sheer  waste.  These  humble  people 
are  the  economists  of  humanity.  They  save 
what  we  squander.  Every  time  one  of  them 
goes  without  a  meal,  there  is  that  much  more 
food  left  in  the  world  for  the  rest  of  us.  James 
Howell  wrote  of  the  Spaniard  in  1623,  "He 
hath  another  commendable  quality,  that  when 
he  giveth  alms  he  pulls  off  his  hat  and  puts  it 
in  the  beggar's  hand  with  a  great  deal  of  hu- 
mility." Let  us  say,  rather,  with  a  great  deal 
of  respect  and  gratitude.  Truly  the  Spanish 
grandee  had  reason  to  be  grateful  and  respect- 
ful to  the  beggar  who  made  possible  his  own 
magnificence. 

Now,  Sir,  what  are  these  charitable  organiza- 
tions trying  to  do?  I  will  tell  you — they  are 
trying  to  teach  the  beggar  that  he  wants  the 
comforts  of  life.  They  are  trying  to  teach  him 
to  desire  good  clothes  and  good  food.  They 
are  trying  to  awaken  in  him  that  selfish  desire 


BEGGARS  171 

to  appear  better  than  his  fellows,  which  we  call 
"self-respect".  They  are  even  trying  to  teach 
him  to  work!  What  folly! 

"But,"  you  say,  "it  would  be  an  excellent 
thing  if  all  of  these  vagabonds  could  be  in- 
duced to  work,  for  heretofore  they  have  been 
mere  idlers  and  parasites."  To  which  I  answer, 
"You  are  wrong,  it  would  not  be  a  good  thing." 
Is  it  not  perfectly  clear  that,  once  these  beg- 
gars become  workers,  they  will  immediately  de- 
mand the  means  to  enable  them  to  maintain  a 
higher  standard  of  living?  Which  do  you  think 
costs  you  the  more,  the  beggar  who  begs  per- 
haps a  dollar  a  week,  which  he  has  not  earned, 
or  the  bricklayer  who  charges  you  six  dollars 
a  day,  of  which  he  has  earned  only  a  part?  It 
has  been  some  years  now  since  the  notorious 
Coxey  led  his  army  of  unemployed  to  Wash- 
ington, and  since  that  time  the  number  of  un- 
employed workers  has  been  steadily  increasing. 
Do  you  think,  then,  that  we  need  more  labor- 
ers? Have  we  so  much  wealth  that  we  must 
force  it  on  those  who  were  content  to  be  with- 
out it? 


172  NEW   BROOMS 

Why,  Sir,  I  tell  you  this  corruption  of  beg- 
gars should  be  put  down  with  a  firm  hand. 
These  charitable  organizations  should  be  legis- 
lated out  of  existence  before  they  do  an  ir- 
reparable mischief. 

I  am,  Sir, 

HENRY  HARDHEAD. 


THE  ABUSES  OF  ADVERSISY 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  In  the  course  of  a  long  and  not 
uneventful  life,  I  have,  upon  more  than  one 
occasion,  looked  upon  adversity  in  its  various 
forms,  and  I  have,  therefore,  given  the  sub- 
ject some  attention,  both  in  the  light  of  my 
own  experience  and  in  the  light  of  the  opinions 
of  others.  I  have  heard  a  great  deal  of  the 
"uses  of  adversity";  that  adversity  is  like  a 
great  training-school  for  character  which 
brings  out  whatever  strength  and  resolution 
there  may  be  in  a  man,  and  much  talk  of  a  like 
character.  But  I  must  confess  that  I  have  not 
often  seen  adversity,  nor  its  lessons,  put  to  any 
good  use  whatever,  while  I  have  often  seen  it 
abused  most  shamefully. 

So  far  from  learning  useful  lessons  from 
ill- fortune,  it  seems  to  me  that  most  men  are 
inclined  to  turn  misfortune  to  the  basest  of 

173 


174  NEW   BROOMS 

uses,  making  it  serve  as  an  excuse  for  shirking, 
for  moral  lapses,  for  dishonesty  and  for  an  ut- 
ter lack  of  charity  toward  others.  I  find  that 
many  people  boast  of  their  misfortunes  as  if 
they  were  actually  entitled  to  some  credit  be- 
cause they  have  befallen  them,  wearing  woe 
like  a  feather  in  the  cap  and  holding  themselves 
somewhat  better  than  their  fellows  because  they 
appear  to  have  excited  the  wrath  of  the  God- 
dess of  Fortune.  It  is  as  if  they  said:  "See, 
we  are  the  Unfortunate  Ones  who  are  of  suffi- 
cient importance  to  be  singled  out  from  among 
men  to  receive  Sorrows  which  you  are  unfit  to 
bear.  Look  upon  our  afflictions  and  reflect 
upon  the  happiness  of  your  own  lot,  and  do  not 
forget  to  do  us  honor  for  the  fortitude  with 
which  we  bear  our  miseries." 

I  count  among  my  friends  and  acquaint- 
ances a  number  of  these  habitual  boasters  of 
misfortune,  who  are  always  ready,  day  or 
night,  to  relate  their  trials  and  tribulations  with 
a  conscious  air  of  distinction  and  superiority. 

There  is  an  old  fellow  of  my  acquaintance 
who  suffers,  or  so  he  declares,  the  torments  of 


THE    ABUSES    OF    ADVERSITY  175 

the  damned,  by  reason  of  his  gout,  a  disease 
which  has  held  him  in  its  grip  for  the  last 
twenty  years.  There  is  no  manner  of  doubt 
that  he  has  himself  to  blame  for  this  painful 
malady,  which  is,  without  question,  the  result 
of  his  injudicious  and  riotous  manner  of  life 
in  his  youth.  Yet  this  old  man  is  as  proud  of 
his  infirmity  as  many  another  man  is  of  phys- 
ical soundness,  and  he  relates  his  pangs  and 
twinges  with  the  greatest  relish  in  the  world. 
Nor  does  the  fact  that  he  has  suffered  from 
the  disease  for  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century 
have  any  effect  upon  the  eagerness  with  which 
he  always  turns  the  conversation  upon  his  fa- 
vorite topic.  Despite  the  fact  that  he  has  told 
and  retold  his  pains  and  symptoms  ten  thou- 
sand times,  the  subject  never  seems  to  lose  its 
novelty  for  him,  and  to-day  he  discusses  his  in- 
firmity with  as  much  gusto  as  he  did  when  I 
first  met  him  ten  years  or  more  ago.  It  makes 
no  difference  what  may  be  the  subject  of  the 
company's  discourse,  this  man  can  not  bear  to 
go  twenty  minutes  without  intruding  the  mat- 
ter of  his  lame  foot. 


176  NEW   BROOMS 

Politics,  business,  history,  music,  literature, 
art  or  the  drama — all  these  are  but  verbal  step- 
ping-stones to  his  one  supreme  subject.  Does 
some  one  speak  of  Napoleon  at  the  foot  of  the 
great  Pyramids,  the  mere  mention  of  the  word 
"foot"  is  enough  to  set  him  discoursing  of  the 
inflammation  in  his  great  toe.  Does  some  one 
call  attention  to  the  flaming  crimson  of  the  sun- 
set, he  swears  that  it  is  not  so  red  as  his  own 
instep.  He  never  enters  a  conversation,  in 
short,  but  to  put  his  foot  in  it,  and  so  persist- 
ently does  he  dwell  upon  this  malformed  pedal 
extremity  as  to  render  him  fit  company  for 
none  but  chiropodists.  He  has  no  interest  in 
life  but  his  gout,  and  he  is  forever  talking  of 
the  pain  it  causes  him,  though  I  dare  say  it  has 
never  caused  him  a  tenth  part  of  the  misery 
that  it  has  caused  his  friends  and  acquaintances. 

Another  person  whom  I  have  the  misfortune 
to  know  is  a  widow  lady  of  some  nine  years* 
standing,  who  has  never  put  off  her  weeds  and 
who  never  tires  of  bewailing  the  loss  of  the 
dear  departed.  The  bare  mention  of  death  is  a 
sufficient  warrant  for  a  flood  of  tears,  and  the 


THE    ABUSES    OF   ADVERSITY  177 

sight  of  a  hearse  sends  her  into  hysterics  which 
abate  only  at  the  prospect  of  a  sympathetic  au- 
dience for  the  old  story  of  her  bereavement. 
She  goes  about  the  neighborhood  casting  the 
shadow  of  death  upon  all  our  innocent  pleas- 
ures and  brings  with  her  into  our  happy  homes 
the  gloom  of  the  mortuary  chamber.  Her  long- 
continued  mourning  and  complaint  are  the  less 
deserving  of  patience  and  sympathy  when  we 
reflect  that  her  husband  was  already  past  the 
age  of  seventy-five  when  he  died,  so  that  no- 
body but  the  most  infatuated  mourner  could 
speak,  as  she  does,  of  his  having  been  "cut  off 
in  his  prime."  One  would  think,  to  hear  her 
speak  of  him,  that  other  men  were  in  the  habit 
of  living  to  the  age  of  Methuselah  and  that  no 
other  woman  in  the  world  had  cause  to  mourn 
her  spouse.  For  my  part,  I  think  the  old  man 
had  small  reason  to  complain  of  premature  de- 
mise, and  I  know  that  were  I  her  husband  I 
would  ask  nothing  better.  To  cast  the  slight- 
est suspicion  upon  the  genuineness  of  her 
grief  or  the  sufficiency  of  the  cause  thereof 
would  be  to  lay  one's  self  open  to  a  tongue 


178  NEW   BROOMS 

which  can  be  most  bitter  when  it  chooses ;  so  I 
fear  we  shall  have  to  bear  her  complaints  and 
her  mourning  until  she  dissolves  in  tears  like 
Niobe,  or  until  Death  gives  ear  to  her  publicly 
expressed  desire  to  join  her  mate  beyond  the 
grave. 

My  cousin,  Robert  Wasrich,  is  forever  tell- 
ing of  the  wealth  and  luxury  which  were  his  in 
his  younger  days  and  complaining  of  the 
lowly  estate  into  which  he  is  fallen  in  his  mid- 
dle age.  The  quarters  in  which  he  now  resides 
are  of  the  humblest,  but  he  speaks  of  them  most 
ostentatiously  to  all  who  have  not  visited  them, 
referring  to  them  as  "chambers"  and  adding 
that,  while  they  are  far  above  the  average,  they 
are  not  at  all  what  he  has  been  used  to  in  other 
years.  When  we  have  him  for  our  guest,  which 
we  do  out  of  pity  at  Christmas  and  such  sea- 
sons when  it  seems  shameful  to  neglect  one's 
own  kin,  he  upsets  our  whole  household  with  his 
constant  complaints  and  exactions. 

So,  far  from  trying  to  make  himself 
as  little  a  nuisance  as  possible,  he  must 
needs  take  his  breakfast  in  bed  because 


THE    ABUSES    OF    ADVERSITY  179 

that  was  his  custom  in  the  days  of  his 
prosperity,  and  he  must  be  supplied  with 
all  sorts  of  dainties  and  extra  dishes  because 
his  stomach,  so  he  says,  craves  them,  having  be- 
come accustomed  to  them  when  he  was  wealthy. 
He  finds  fault  with  the  cooking,  saying  that  it 
probably  seems  well  enough  to  us,  who  have 
never  been  used  to  anything  better,  but  that  it 
is  death  to  the  palate  of  one  who  has  been  in 
the  habit  of  eating  and  drinking  of  the  best. 
He  picks  flaws  in  our  pictures  and  decries  our 
taste  in  furnishings,  and  so  sends  my  wife  off 
to  her  chamber  in  a  fit  of  indignant  weeping. 
And  not  content  with  all  this,  he  is  forever 
borrowing  of  me  small  sums  of  money  which 
he  declares  he  stands  in  need  of  to  pay  off  cer- 
tain obligations  to  friends  whom  he  has  known 
in  his  better  days  and  who  have  seen  fit  to  ask 
him  to  dinner  or  to  the  play.  To  allow  such  ob- 
ligations to  go  unpaid  would  be  most  offensive 
to  his  acute  sense  of  honor  and  would  cast  dis- 
credit upon  his  honored  name.  In  fact,  Mr. 
Idler,  he  is  twice  as  arrogant  and  proud  in  his 
poverty  as  he  was  when  he  was  well-off.  And 


180  NEW   BROOMS 

more  than  once  I  have  wished  with  all  my  heart 
that  he  might  be  rich  again,  and  so  take  him- 
self off  and  leave  us  in  peace. 

To  come  nearer  home,  my  wife  is  the  victim 
of  a  nervous  disorder  which  totally  incapaci- 
tates her  from  doing  our  housework,  though 
we  can  ill  afford  a  servant,  but  which,  oddly 
enough,  does  not  interfere  with  her  attendance 
at  matinees  or  card-parties  given  by  her  women 
friends.  This  is  doubtless  due,  as  she  says,  to 
the  fact  that  exertion  which  is  in  the  nature  of 
a  diversion  takes  her  mind  from  her  trouble 
and  so  mends  her  condition  for  the  time  being. 
Though  this  disorder  is  not  in  the  least  dan- 
gerous, it  is  most  obstinate  and  causes  her,  so 
she  assures  me,  the  most  acute  mental  anguish 
and  the  most  terrible  physical  suffering.  It  is 
of  such  a  peculiar  nature  that  any  mention  of 
the  amount  of  the  month's  bills  sets  it  instantly 
in  motion,  and  disappointment  in  the  matter 
of  getting  a  new  hat  is  enough  to  cause  her  to 
take  to  her  bed  for  a  week.  But  though,  as  you 
can  readily  see,  this  indisposition  puts  her  to  a 
great  deal  of  trouble  and  annoyance,  she  will 


THE    ABUSES    OF    ADVERSITY  181 

not  consent  to  enter  a  sanatorium  where  she 
might  be  cured  of  it,  nor  will  she  follow  the 
advice  of  the  doctor  whom  she  calls  in  from 
one  to  three  times  a  month ;  so  that  I  am  forced 
to  conclude  that  she  is  actually  proud  of  be- 
ing an  invalid.  And  I  am  the  more  of  this 
opinion,  since  when  I  complain  of  feeling  ill 
or  indisposed,  she  always  assures  me  that  I  do 
not  know  what  suffering  is  and  that  I  never 
can  know  because  I  was  not  born  a  woman. 

These  and  other  cases  which  have  come  un- 
der my  observation  have  convinced  me  that 
people  are  more  proud  of  their  afflictions  than 
of  their  blessings,  and  that  the  most  common 
use  of  adversity  is  to  make  life  miserable  for 
others.  I  am,  Sir, 

EDWARD  EASYMAN. 


THE  SCIENCE  OF  MAKING  ENEMIES 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  As  I  am  about  to  open  a  school 
of  an  unusual  nature,  I  have  determined  not 
only  to  secure  for  the  same  as  much  publicity 
as  possible,  but  also  to  explain  to  the  public  the 
nature  of  the  instruction  which  will  be  fur- 
nished in  my  new  academy.  My  course  of 
study  is,  I  think,  unique ;  and  I  fear  that  with- 
out explanation  it  would  probably  prove  quite 
incomprehensible  to  the  public  at  large  and  to 
those  who  may  chance  to  hear  of  the  school 
through  friends  or  to  read  my  advertisements 
in  the  press. 

In  this  connection,  it  seems  to  me  not  out  of 
place  to  acquaint  you,  in  some  sort,  with  the 
reasons  which  led  me  to  settle  upon  the  plan  of 
my  proposed  course  of  instruction,  and  this  I 
shall  accordingly  do  to  the  best  of  my  ability. 

I  entered  at  an  early  age  upon  my  present 
182 


ENEMIES  183 

profession,  which  is,  as  you  may  have  surmised, 
that  of  an  educator.  I  became,  in  turn, 
an  instructor,  a  tutor  and  a  professor  of  so- 
ciology. I  have  ever  been  of  an  independent 
character  of  mind,  and  in  the  course  of  my 
work  I  have  been  prone  to  draw  my  own  con- 
clusions without,  I  confess,  much  consideration 
of,  or  regard  for,  the  opinions  of  others  who 
assume,  or  have  assumed,  to  be  authorities  upon 
the  subject.  Society,  I  believe,  is  a  subject 
which  must  be  studied  at  first  hand.  Text- 
books and  treatises  may  be  well  enough  as  stim- 
ulants to  study,  but  the  real  essential  is  a 
knowledge  of  people.  I,  therefore,  devoted 
myself  to  the  study  of  mankind,  and  I  studied 
the  students  of  my  classes  with  more  enthusi- 
asm and  with  more  application,  I  dare  say,  than 
my  students  studied  their  text-books.  But  I 
did  not  stop  with  the  study  of  others,  I  also 
studied  myself.  I  studied  myself  as  an  isolated 
individual,  and  I  studied  myself  in  relation  to 
others,  and  it  was  as  a  result  of  this  study  that 
I  finally  made  a  most  disconcerting  discovery 
— a  discovery  which  was  not  made  until  I  had 


184  NEW   BROOMS 

entered  upon  my  professorship,  and  which 
shocked  me  inexpressibly  and  bade  fair,  for  a 
time,  to  put  an  end  to  my  career  as  a  teacher. 
Though  at  first  it  was  only  a  suspicion,  it  soon 
became  a  conviction.  I  discovered  that  I  was 
unpopular.  Not  unpopular  with  a  few  only, 
for  all  of  us  are  that,  but  generally  and  hope- 
lessly unpopular;  a  man  without  any  friends 
and  with  a  great  many  enemies.  I  do  not  now 
recall  what  first  called  my  attention  to  this 
matter,  but  I  do  remember  that  I  gave  it  a 
great  deal  of  thought  and  attention  and  I 
studied  the  case  in  the  same  impartial  manner 
that  I  would  study  any  other  case  of  social 
phenomena.  I  took  careful  note  of  the  de- 
meanor and  behavior  of  my  students  and  my 
fellow  members  of  the  faculty,  and  I  soon  set- 
tled beyond  any  reasonable  doubt  all  question 
as  to  my  popularity.  I  had  never  established 
myself  upon  a  footing  of  familiarity  or 
friendship  with  my  students  and  I  now  came 
to  see  the  reason  why  this  was  so.  My  students 
did  not  like  me  and  they  would  have  nothing 
more  to  do  with  me  than  was  absolutely  neces- 


ENEMIES  185 

sary.  It  was  the  same  with  the  members  of  the 
faculty.  I  was  retained  in  my  position  because 
I  was  an  able  instructor  and  an  indefatigable 
worker.  There  was  no  sort  of  favoritism  in  my 
case  and  I  knew  that  my  colleagues  as  well  as 
my  students  would  have  been  glad  to  see  me 
guilty  of  some  blunder  which  would  justify 
my  removal. 

As  you  may  suppose,  this  was  not  only  a 
hard  blow  to  my  vanity,  but  a  very  painful 
thing  to  think  upon.  Like  most  men,  I  had 
always  assumed  that  people  were  glad  to  know 
me  and  to  have  me  about,  and  it  distressed  me 
exceedingly  to  learn  that  this  assumption  was 
without  foundation  or  justification.  It  is  one 
of  the  enigmas  of  human  nature — this  convic- 
tion of  personal  popularity.  No  man  can  con- 
ceive of  himself  as  a  pariah,  nor  even  as  a  very 
unpopular  person,  until  he  actually  finds  him- 
self in  that  situation.  Even  the  greatest  bores 
seldom  realize  that  they  are  bores.  But  most 
bores  are  not  sociologists. 

Now,  when  I  had  become  fully  convinced 
that  my  unpopularity  was  a  fact  and  not  a  fig- 


186  NEW   BROOMS 

ment  of  my  imagination,  I  began  to  turn  the 
matter  over  in  my  mind  and  to  direct  my  atten- 
tion to  the  study  of  popularity  and  unpopular- 
ity both  as  to  cause  and  effect.  My  study  led 
me  to  several  discoveries.  The  first  was  this: 
that  some  people  are  born  with  the  attribute  of 
popularity  and  possess  the  faculty  of  making 
friends  without  any  conscious  effort  on  their 
part,  while  others  have  a  trick  of  making  ene- 
mies without  actually  being  guilty  of  any  of- 
fense. This  is  not  what  is  called  positive  and 
negative  "magnetism,"  but  it  is  something  like 
that.  When  a  man  possesses  this  faculty  for 
making  friends  he  will  make  them  whether  or 
no,  even  though  he  be  lacking  in  all  the  quali- 
ties which  men  find  admirable.  He  may  be 
selfish,  cold,  over-ambitious  and  ruthless  of  the 
rights  of  others,  and  yet  exercise  a  fascination 
upon  other  men.  Such  a  man  was  Napoleon 
Bonaparte,  who  called  forth  the  greatest  per- 
sonal devotion  and  enthusiasm  in  the  men 
whom  he  destroyed  for  his  own  ends.  Contrari- 
wise, a  man  may  be  noble,  generous,  affable 


ENEMIES  187 

and  everything  that  a  popular  man  should  be, 
and  yet  be  practically  without  friends. 

But  I  made  another  and  greater  discovery 
which  reconciled  me  to  my  unpopularity  and 
which,  indeed,  completely  revolutionized  my 
views  upon  the  subject — I  discovered  that  the 
greatest  men  in  the  world  have  been  the  ones 
who  had  the  most  enemies! 

And  it  was  upon  making  this  discovery,  Sir 
— the  most  important,  in  my  opinion,  that  has 
been  made  by  any  sociologist  of  our  time — that 
I  determined  to  set  up  my  school  for  the  ex- 
position of  the  science  of  making  enemies.  All 
men,  said  I  to  myself,  are  naturally  ambitious ; 
they  desire  fame,  honor  and  riches.  They  have 
but  to  be  shown  the  way  and  they  will  enter 
eagerly  upon  it. 

Elated  as  I  was  at  my  great  discovery,  I 
could  not  but  wonder  that  men  had  not  discov- 
ered this  secret  long  ago.  How  could  such 
men  as  Spencer,  Lecky,  Schopenhauer,  Niet- 
zsche and  the  others  have  overlooked  a  thing  so 
simple  and  so  obviously  true? 


188  NEW   BROOMS 

Here,  I  rejoiced,  I  have  a  discovery — not  a 
theory,  not  an  hypothesis — but  a  fact!  A  fact 
which  may  be  tested  and  proven  in  any  field  of 
human  activity — in  government,  in  commerce, 
in  religion,  in  literature,  in  art — in  everything ! 
No  religion  can  live  without  first  enduring  per- 
secution; no  government  can  survive  without 
the  patriotism  bred  of  the  fear  of  enemies  and 
the  hatred  of  foes;  no  general  can  become 
great  without  war;  no  author  becomes  a  classic 
without  criticism ;  no  prophet  can  conquer  with- 
out opposition.  Nothing  great  can  be  done 
without  enemies. 

For  generations,  for  ages,  men  have  been 
proceeding  upon  an  entirely  erroneous  theory 
that  friends  are  more  necessary  to  success  than 
enemies.  Such  stupidity!  Such  utter  disregard 
of  the  evidence  to  the  contrary  which  confronts 
us  upon  every  hand!  Our  park  benches  are 
lined  with  men  who  had  too  many  friends,  our 
charitable  institutions  are  overflowing  with 
them.  Think  of  the  most  popular  man  you 
know  and  then  of  the  most  successful!  Are 
they  the  same?  Of  course  not.  Once  you  stop 


ENEMIES  189 

to  think  of  it,  the  truth  of  my  discovery  is  self- 
evident.  No  matter  where  you  go  you  will  find 
that  the  greatest  man  is  the  one  who  has  the 
most  enemies. 

Friends  are  not  only  not  necessary  to  a  man's 
success,  but  they  are  often  a  positive  detriment. 
A  man  surrounded  by  friends  is  like  a  man 
blindfolded — he  can  not  see  where  he  is  going. 
How  do  you  improve?  By  correcting  your 
faults.  And  who  points  out  your  faults,  your 
friends  or  your  enemies?  An  enemy  is  a  spur. 
An  enemy  is  an  inspiration.  Your  friends 
sympathize  with  you,  commiserate  with  you, 
agree  with  you  and  flatter  you;  but  your  ene- 
mies advertise  you. 

Whistler  once  wrote  a  book  called  The  Gen- 
tle Art  of  Making  Enemies,  and  I  suspect  that 
Whistler  had  caught  an  inkling  of  the  truth 
of  my  great  discovery,  but  his  title  was  a  mis- 
nomer. The  making  of  enemies  is  not  an  art, 
but  a  science.  Some  people  have  a  special  gift 
for  it,  as  I  have,  but  almost  any  one  can  learn 
how.  By  observing  a  few  simple  rules  in  this 
connection,  any  man  should  be  able  to  acquire 


190  NEW   BROOMS 

all  the  enemies  he  may  desire.  But  any  man 
may  save  himself  a  great  deal  of  time  and 
trouble  by  taking  my  course  of  instruction. 
When  he  receives  his  diploma  from  the  Sour- 
face  Training  School  he  will  be  so  well  versed 
in  this  science  that  he  will  thereafter  follow  the 
principles  of  the  school  without  any  thought 
whatever,  but  purely  from  force  of  habit. 

Judging  from  the  number  of  people  I  see 
about  me  who  are  trying  in  an  amateurish  way 
to  acquire  enemies,  the  academy  should  have  a 
large  attendance  from  the  start,  and  since  I 
have  never  met  a  more  unpopular  man  than 
myself,  I  know  of  no  one  more  eminently 
qualified  to  conduct  such  a  school.  I  can  not 
afford  to  make  public  my  method  of  instruc- 
tion because  such  an  action  would  open  the  field 
to  a  host  of  imitators,  but  I  can  assure  you  that 
the  course  is  most  effective. 

There  is  only  one  doubt  in  my  mind  about 
the  success  of  the  school,  and  that  is  this:  I 
fear  that  when  the  public  realizes  the  tremen- 
dous import  of  my  discovery  and  appreciates 
the  great  work  which  I  am  doing  for  human- 


ENEMIES  191 

ity,  I  shall  become  so  popular  that  I  will  be  in 
great  danger  of  losing  the  success  which  I  have 
labored  so  hard  to  attain  and  which  I  so  richly 
deserve.  Truly  yours, 

SAMUEL  SOTJRFACE, 

Headmaster,  Sourface  Training  School. 
CRANKTOWN.,  NEW  JERSEY. 


THE  FATE  OF  FALSTAFF 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  am  an  actor;  a  follower  of 
Thespis,  an  interpreter  of  men  and  emotions. 
To  become  such  was  the  dream  of  my  boy- 
hood's ambition.  At  an  early  age  (I  shall  not 
state  when,  since  you  would  probably  be  incred- 
ulous) I  used,  Sir,  to  act  plays  for  my  own 
amusement  and  afterward  for  the  amusement 
of  my  elders.  Where  other  children  were  con- 
tent to  play  in  careless  fashion,  without  at- 
tempting anything  like  an  exact  reproduction 
or  imitation  of  Nature,  I  was  most  particular 
in  this  respect.  If  I  played  Julius  Ca3sar,  I 
had,  to  satisfy  my  artistic  instinct,  to  carry  a 
short  sword  and  not  a  long  one ;  I  must  needs 
wrap  myself  in  a  sheet  and  swear  by  the 
heathen  gods.  Nothing  short  of  this  satisfied 
me.  I  could  not,  as  so  many  children  do,  thrust 

192 


THE   FATE    OF    FALSTAFF    193 

a  feather  duster  down  the  neck  of  my  jacket 
and  play  at  being  an  Indian  chief;  on  the  con- 
trary, I  must  have  the  feathers  in  my  hair  and 
my  complexion  darkened  until  I  bore  some  ac- 
tual resemblance  to  the  aborigine.  Without 
these  aids  to  illusion  I  could  not  enjoy  myself 
or  get  any  manner  of  amusement  from  the 
sport.  I  was  so  close  a  student  of  details,  even 
at  that  age,  that  in  playing  Indian  I  acquired 
a  habit  of  toeing-in  which  caused  my  mother 
much  distress  and  which  clung  to  me  for  many 
months. 

Nor  was  I  less  particular  in  the  matter  of  my 
speech.  I  was  forever  mouthing  sentiments 
and  speeches  culled  from  my  father's  library, 
some  of  them,  I  dare  say,  weird  and  bizarre 
enough  upon  my  youthful  and  innocent 
lips.  However  this  may  be,  I  had  an  abiding 
horror  of  all  sorts  of  anachronisms,  and  I  pre- 
ferred Ben  Jonson  to  Shakespeare  for  the 
reason  that  he  was  less  frequently  guilty  of 
offending  my  artistic  sense  in  this  respect. 

It  was  not  long  before  my  parents  were  im- 
pressed with  my  natural  bent  in  this  direction 


194  NEW   BROOMS 

and  encouraged  me  in  my  favorite  diversion  by 
taking  the  part  of  an  audience,  while  my 
younger  brother  was  pressed  into  service  with 
his  harmonica  and  rendered  the  overtures  and 
the  interludes  to  the  best  of  his  somewhat  lim- 
ited ability ;  for  I  could  no  more  act  without  an 
orchestra  than  I  could  act  without  a  make-up. 
Incidentally  I  came  to  practise  the  art  of  elo- 
cution, and  it  was  said  in  our  neighborhood  that 
I  could  interpret  Horatio  at  the  Bridge  in  a 
most  telling  fashion,  and  that  not  Riley  himself 
could  improve  upon  my  rendition  of  The  Rag- 
gedy Man. 

With  such  a  wealth  of  youthful  experience, 
it  was  not  surprising  that  I  found  myself  at  the 
age  of  twenty-one  a  supernumerary  in  a 
theater,  nor  that  soon  afterward  I  was 
given  a  speaking  part  and  rose,  before  long,  to 
the  dignity  of  "leads"  in  a  stock  company  of 
the  first  class.  It  was  at  this  time  that  I  was 
given  my  first  opportunity  really  to  distinguish 
myself.  A  prominent  manager,  who  shall  be 
nameless,  sent  for  me  and  told  me  that  he  had 
chosen  me  to  play  Falstaff  in  a  production  of 


THE    FATE    OF   FALSTAFF    195 

Henry  the  Fourth  which  he  intended  put- 
ting on  the  following  winter. 

Elated  as  I  was  at  this  splendid  opportunity 
for  a  display  of  my  genius  for  acting,  I  could 
not  forbear  voicing  certain  conscientious  scru- 
ples as  to  my  ability  to  do  the  part  justice. 

"I  can  undoubtedly  interpret  the  character 
to  your  most  complete  satisfaction,"  said  I  to 
the  manager,  "but  there  is  an  obstacle,  which, 
while  by  no  means  unsurmountable,  must,  nev- 
ertheless, be  overcome  at  once  or  not  at  all." 

"And  what  is  that?"  he  inquired. 

"Why,"  said  I,  "I  am  not  fat  enough." 

"What  odds?"  he  answered;  "while  there  are 
pads  and  pillows,  this  should  be  no  matter  for 
despair.  You  have  only  to  stuff  your  doublet 
and  pad  your  hose  until  you  are  as  swollen  as 
you  like." 

"That,"  I  protested,  "may  do  very  well  for 
your  merely  commercial  actors  who  have  no 
concern  in  their  acting  beyond  the  matter  of 
drawing  a  salary;  but  I,  Sir,  am  an  actor,  not 
a  mere  buffoon,  not  a  vulgar  clown  to  waddle 
about  a  stage  wagging  a  hypocritical  belly  and 


196  NEW   BROOMS 

passing  off  feathers  for  fat.  If  I  am  to  play 
Falstaff ,  I  will  be  Falstaff ,  in  the  flesh  as  well 
as  in  the  spirit.  My  corporosity  shall  be  sin- 
cere, my  puffing  and  grunting  shall  be  genu- 
ine; I  will  eat  real  food  and  drink  real  liquor 
upon  your  stage,  and  when  I  waddle  I  shall 
waddle  as  Nature  intended  fat  men  to  waddle 
— because  I  can  not  help  it.  My  calves  shall  be 
as  natural  as  Sir  John's  own,  so  that  if  I  am 
pricked  with  the  point  of  a  rapier,  I  shall  give 
utterance  to  a  howl  which  is  not  mere  mockery, 
but  as  real  as  a  howl  may  well  be,  and  which 
will  delight  the  audience  as  no  feigned  howl 
ever  could  do. 

"No,  no!  I  shall  not  play  Falstaff  like  a 
clown  in  a  pantomime,  but  like  that  very 
knight  himself.  My  performance  shall  be  as 
real  as  the  performance  of  Nature.  I  will  be 
Sir  John  redivivus.  Falstaff  shall  live  again 
in  me.  He  shall  be  I  and  I  will  be  he,  and  there 
is  an  end  of  it." 

Well,  Sir,  to  be  brief,  the  manager  was  so 
struck  with  my  unusual  and,  I  may  say,  unaf- 
fected, sincerity,  that  he  voluntarily  advanced 


THE    FATE    OF    FALSTAFF    197 

me  a  portion  of  my  salary  and  agreed  to  my 
proposal  that,  instead  of  wasting  valuable 
time  in  rehearsing  a  part  in  which  I  -was  al- 
ready practically  letter-perfect,  my  part  in  the 
rehearsals  should  be  taken  by  a  substitute, 
while  I  retired  to  the  country  and  devoted  my- 
self to  my  labor  of  love — to  the  task  of  putting 
on  so  much  flesh  as  would  be  necessary  to  act 
with  fidelity  the  pursy  knight  errant.  And  this 
I  did  to  so  good  purpose  that  from  my  normal 
weight  of  about  one  hundred  and  ninety 
pounds,  I  soon  came  to  weigh  upward  of  two 
hundred  and  eighty,  and  was  as  fat  as  any  one 
could  wish  when  we  opened  in  Henry  the 
Fourth  in  the  Autumn. 

To  say,  Sir,  that  my  performance  was  a  suc- 
cess is  to  do  scant  justice  to  the  literary  ability 
of  William  Shakespeare  and  to  my  own  histri- 
onic powers.  It  was  not  merely  a  success — it 
was  a  triumph!  Ah,  Sir,  if  I  could  but  whisper 
in  your  ear  the  name  by  which  I  was  known 
in  those  days  of  superlative  glory,  you  would 
recall  in  the  flash  of  an  eye  the  days  when  the 
whole  of  the  English-speaking  world  was 


198  NEW   BROOMS 

vulsed  with  merriment  at  my  performance  and 
when  press  and  public  were  vying  with  each 
other  to  do  me  honor!  Never  was  such  a  per- 
formance of  Falstaff  given  before,  and  never, 
I  fear,  will  such  a  performance  be  given  again. 
I  was  FalstafF  to  the  very  life!  Falstaff  in  per- 
son and  not  to  be  mistaken  for  any  one  else. 
You  could  have  sworn  that  I  had  stepped 
bodily  out  of  the  pages  of  the  folio  edition  and 
thrust  my  way  into  the  theater  of  my  own  voli- 
tion, usurping  the  place  of  the  actor. 

Four  whole  seasons  we  played  to  crowded 
houses — New  York,  Chicago,  San  Francisco 
and  London — and  everywhere  the  critics  all 
agreed  that  never  had  such  a  perfect  Falstaff 
been  seen  before.  This  we  followed  with  The 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  repeating  our  suc- 
cess for  two  seasons,  so  that  for  six  years  I  was 
known  to  every  actor  and  patron  of  the  theater 
as  the  greatest  Falstaff  that  ever  was. 

But  Fate,  alas!  however  prodigal  she  may 
appear  for  a  time,  is  not  constant  in  her  favors. 
All  things  come  to  an  end  sooner  or  later,  and 
our  production  of  The  Merry  Wives  ran  its 


THE    FATE    OF    FALSTAFF    199 

course  in  time.  How  well  do  I  remember  that 
last  night  of  all — the  glitter  of  the  electrics 
overhead,  the  glare  of  the  footlights,  the  music 
of  the  orchestra,  and,  oh,  above  all  else,  the 
thunderous  applause  that  greeted  me  when  I 
appeared  before  the  curtain,  clad  in  trunks  and 
doublet,  to  make  my  farewell  speech!  There 
ended  our  production,  and  there  ended  my 
greatness  and  my  life.  My  grossness  I  have 
still,  but  my  greatness  has  fled  forever!  Dis- 
consolate I  wander  through  the  haunts  of 
stageland,  a  fat  pale  ghost  of  my  former  self; 
a  Falstaff  out  of  place  and  out  of  time ;  a  Fal- 
staff  without  jollity  or  joy.  I,  Sir,  have  be- 
come that  thing  which  I  hate  above  all  other 
things  in  the  world,  I  have  become  an  An- 
achronism ! 

Conceive,  if  you  can,  my  consternation  when 
I  discovered  my  dilemma.  Having  no  further 
need  for  my  excessive  flesh,  I  sought  to  reduce 
my  weight  only  to  find  that  I  could  not  lose  it! 
Six  years  of  playing  Falstaff  had  made  me 
Falstaff  for  good  or  ill.  No  fighter  of  the 
prize-ring,  no  beauty  of  the  court,  ever  la- 


200  NEW   BROOMS 

bored  as  I  labored  to  struggle  back  to  slimness. 
No  Hamlet  ever  cried  more  earnestly  than  I, 

"Oh,  that  this  too,  too  solid  flesh  would  meltl" 

Like  Sisyphus,  I  toiled  for  months  with  my 
burden,  rolling  off  flesh  only  to  have  it  roll  on 
again,  until  at  last  I  gave  up  in  despair. 

No  manager  would  employ  me  to  play  for 
him — I  was  too  fat.  Too  fat  to  act,  too  fat  to 
play  at  any  part  but  one.  Once  only  since  that 
time  have  I  tried  to  obtain  an  engagement  and 
that  was  when  I  saw  an  advertisement  of  a  re- 
vival of  my  own  great  play,  Henry  the 
Fourth.  But  would  you  believe  it,  Sir,  the 
manager  had  the  impudence  to  laugh  in  my 
face,  to  deny  the  truth  of  my  story  and  scoff 
at  my  insistence  upon  my  identity.  He  called 
me,  Sir,  a  fat  slob!  In  desperation  I  tried  a 
Dime  Museum,  only  to  be  told  that  no  "fat 
freaks"  were  employed  who  weighed  less  than 
three  hundred  and  fifty  pounds.  At  last  I  fell 
into  my  present  disgraceful  situation;  I  was 
employed  by  a  restaurant -keeper  as  a  decoy. 
In  the  window  of  one  of  the  cheapest  and  vilest 


THE    FATE    OF    FALSTAFF    201 

cafes  in  this  city  I  sit  for  eight  hours  daily 
drawing  a  crowd  about  the  place  while  I  toy 
with  a  knife  and  fork  and  pretend  to  eat  of  a 
meal  that  I  would  not  feed  my  most  bitter  en- 
emy. I  do  not  eat  it.  I  can  not  eat  it.  And  so, 
Sir,  here  I  sit  each  day,  a  mere  husk  of  my 
former  self,  a  hulk,  a  wrecked  Leviathan!  A 
fraud  and  a  freak;  a  delusion  and  a  snare. 
This  have  I  suffered  in  consequence  of  my  de- 
votion to  an  ideal — I  who  was  for  six  years  the 
greatest  Falstaff  the  world  has  ever  known! 

T.  P. 


THE  REWARD  OF  MERIT 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR  :  I  am  an  ashman,  or,  as  they  call 
me  nowadays,  a  scavenger.  It  may  appear  to 
you,  Sir,  a  queer  thing  that  a  man  in  my  station 
in  life  should  address  a  letter  to  an  editor  and 
upon  such  a  subject,  but  when  I  have  made 
you  acquainted  with  the  facts  of  my  case,  I 
think  it  will  not  seem  so  strange. 

It  is  true  that  I  am  now  employed  as  a  scav- 
enger, but  I  was  formerly  the  occupant  of  a 
very  different  station  in  life ;  I  was  formerly  a 
physician.  I  wish  to  lay  before  you  what  I 
consider  the  causes  of  my  descent  in  the  social 
scale.  When  a  man  who  has  once  been  a  mem^ 
her  of  an  honored  profession  is  reduced  to 
manual  labor  of  a  peculiarly  disagreeable  sort, 
the  common  opinion  is  like  to  be  that  he  is  in 
gome  way  responsible  for  his  own  downfall; 
that  he  has  fallen  a  victim  to  drink  or  drugs, 

202 


THE    REWARD    OF   MERIT    203 

to  a  passion  for  gambling,  or  to  some  other  in- 
jurious habit.  In  my  own  case,  I  will  not  deny 
that  the  change  in  my  circumstances  is  prob- 
ably due  to  my  own  conduct,  though  I  do  as- 
sure you  that  it  was  not  caused  by  my  indul- 
gence in  the  habits  which  I  have  mentioned 
above.  To  be  brief,  Sir,  I  am  of  the  opinion 
that  my  present  poverty  and  obscurity  is  noth- 
ing more  nor  less  than  the  reward  of  merit. 

It  has  been  my  observation  that  most  of  the 
favorite  theories  of  the  human  race  are  erro- 
neous. They  come  into  being  as  mere  sugges- 
tions, they  grow  into  convictions,  they  thrive 
as  platitudes,  and  they  die  as  superstitions. 
There  have  been  millions  of  them  since  the 
world  began,  and  I  have  no  doubt  there  will  be 
millions  of  others  before  the  last  man  has  van- 
ished from  the  face  of  the  earth.  Some  of  these 
theories  live  on  long  after  they  have  been 
clearly  demonstrated  to  be  without  foundation 
in  fact,  and  sometimes  they  work  great  harm 
to  the  innocent  persons  who  accept  and  act 
upon  them  in  good  faith.  Such  has  been  my 
sad  experience,  and  the  theory  which  was  re- 


204  NEW   BROOMS 

sponsible  for  my  present  unpleasant  situation 
was  the  theory  that  merit  is  always  rewarded. 

As  a  boy  I  was  of  a  confiding  and  trusting 
nature.  I  believed  all  that  was  told  me,  and  I 
put  especial  faith  in  the  admonitions  and  ad- 
vice of  those  who  were  set  to  instruct  me  in 
manners  and  morals.  One  of  the  first  lessons  I 
learned  was  that  merit  is  always  rewarded; 
and  another,  that  industry  is  the  certain  road 
to  success  and  advancement.  These  things  I 
firmly  believed  to  be  true.  Sundays,  when 
other  boys  of  my  acquaintance  stole  away  to  go 
fishing  or  swimming,  I  went  to  Sunday-school, 
firm  in  the  conviction  that  my  virtue  and  self- 
denial  would  be  amply  rewarded,  though  I  was 
a  bit  hazy  as  to  the  manner  in  which  this  would 
come  about.  It  was  often  a  severe  temptation 
to  hear  the  truants  boasting  of  the  pleasures 
they  had  enjoyed  at  the  swimming-pool  or  at 
the  fork  of  the  creek  where  they  went  to  angle. 
At  the  end  of  my  first  summer  of  Sunday- 
school,  I  was  given  a  crude  picture  card  show- 
ing two  cows  of  peculiar  construction  who  ap- 
peared to  be  enjoying  themselves  immensely 


THE    REWARD    OF    MERIT    205 

in  the  very  river  I  had  shunned  so  religiously. 
Upon  this  card  there  was  printed  a  conspicuous 
legend:  "The  Reward  of  Merit." 

While  this  result  of  my  season  of  piety  was 
not  what  I  had  expected,  I  continued  to  hope 
on  until  I  had  acquired  quite  a  collection  of 
similar  cards,  some  of  them  varied  a  little  as  to 
subject,  but  all  of  the  same  order  of  art,  and  all 
bearing  the  familiar  legend.  Being  of  a  nat- 
urally optimistic  and  sanguine  disposition,  I 
soon  convinced  myself  that  my  mistake  lay  in 
looking  for  material  rewards  in  return  for 
spiritual  industry. 

When  I  entered  the  profession  of  medicine, 
I  still  clung  to  my  theory  of  the  reward  of 
merit,  and  no  sooner  did  I  get  a  patient  than  I 
set  to  work  to  cure  him  as  quickly  as  possible. 
If  a  patient  really  had  nothing  the  matter  with 
him,  I  sent  him  about  his  business.  I  was  not 
a  nerve  specialist  and  I  did  not  care  to  be  both- 
ered with  hypochondriacs.  Though  I  started 
with  an  unusually  good  practise  for  a  young 
physician,  the  result  of  this  course  of  conduct 
was  that  I  found  myself  in  two  years'  time 


206  NEW   BROOMS 

sitting  idle  in  my  office  with  my  waiting-room 
absolutely  empty.  I  had  cured  all  my  patients 
who  were  really  ill  and  I  had  offended  all  who 
only  thought  they  were  ill.  It  seems  that  one 
can  not  offend  a  man  more  than  by  telling  him 
he  is  well  when  he  prefers  to  think  that  he  is 
unwell.  My  patients  who  had  been  cured  had 
no  further  need  of  me,  and  those  whom  I  had 
refused  to  treat  had  no  further  use  for  me,  so 
that  the  tongue  of  malice  completed  the  work 
which  my  own  energy  had  begun.  And  thus, 
for  the  second  time,  my  theory  of  the  reward 
of  merit  had  failed  to  work  out.  Having  made 
one  failure  as  a  doctor,  I  could  never  again  es- 
tablish myself  in  the  practise  of  medicine. 
Wherever  I  went,  the  story  of  my  failure  had 
preceded  me,  so  that  presently  I  found  myself 
dropping  down  and  down  in  the  social  scale 
until  finally  I  awoke  one  morning  to  find  my- 
self a  scavenger. 

"Now,"  said  I  to  myself,  "I  have  touched 
bottom  and  I  must  presently  go  up  again  like 
a  man  who  sinks  in  the  water."  But  my  hopes 
were  not  realized.  I  remained  a  collector  and 


THE    REWARD    OF    MERIT    207 

remover  of  garbage.  My  study  of  hygiene  had 
taught  me  the  evils  of  filth  and  I  could  not, 
therefore,  neglect  my  work  as  a  less  intelligent 
scavenger  might  have  done.  I  knew  that  my 
clients  were  depending  upon  me,  in  a  great  de- 
gree, to  protect  them  from  typhoid  and  kin- 
dred evils,  and  even  though  I  realized  that  this 
dependence  was  more  or  less  unconscious  upon 
their  part,  I  could  no  more  have  shirked  my  re- 
sponsibility than  I  could  have  gone  into  their 
houses  and  killed  them  in  cold  blood.  So  I  went 
to  work  earnestly  and  I  flatter  myself  that 
there  is  no  more  thoroughgoing  workman  in  the 
whole  body  of  scavengers  than  myself. 

Since  I  have  been  engaged  in  this  work  I 
have  made  another  discovery.  I  have  discov- 
ered that  industry  is  by  no  means  a  sure  road 
to  advancement.  When  my  work  is  well  done 
I  am  paid,  but  I  am  not  complimented.  The 
thoroughness  of  my  methods  does  not  attract 
the  attention  of  my  clients.  Nobody  seeks  me 
out  with  a  proffer  of  more  congenial  employ- 
ment. Everybody  appears  to  take  it  for 
granted  that  I  like  to  collect  garbage.  I  do  not. 


208  NEW   BROOMS 

I  have  never  been  a  collector  of  anything  from 
choice.  I  used  to  think  that  any  man  who  col- 
lected stamps  must  be  lacking  in  intelligence, 
but  I  see  now  that  one  may  be  engaged  in  col- 
lecting worse  things  than  stamps.  Nobody 
says  anything  at  all  about  my  work  unless 
something  goes  wrong.  And  this,  I  believe,  is 
usually  the  case. 

I  recently  read  a  copy  of  the  Memoirs  of 
Lieutenant-Colonel  Paul  von  Pulitz,  which  I 
retrieved  from  the  ash-can  of  one  of  my  clients 
who  is  of  a  literary  turn,  and  it  was  through  his 
receptacle  for  discarded  matter,  by  the  way, 
than  I  first  made  the  acquaintance  of  your  ex- 
cellent publication. 

In  these  Memoirs,  which  are  unusually  inter- 
esting in  many  respects,  I  came  upon  an  anec- 
dote which  seems  to  have  a  direct  bearing  upon 
the  question  which  we  are  now  considering.  It 
appears  that  Colonel  von  Pulitz  was  discussing 
with  a  number  of  other  officers  the  chances  and 
mischances  of  a  military  career.  Several  of  the 
officers  had  volunteered  the  causes  to  which  they 
attributed  their  success.  Colonel  von  Pulitz 


THE    REWARD    OF    MERIT    209 

then  related  this  anecdote,  the  truth  of  which 
he  indorses  elsewhere,  and  in  this  he  is  borne 
out  by  the  editor  of  the  autobiography,  Pro- 
fessor Rudolph  Ubermann,  of  Berlin  Uni- 
versity. 

"When  a  young  man,"  writes  Colonel  von 
Pulitz,  "I  fell  into  disgrace  with  my  family 
because  of  a  certain  youthful  escapade — no 
matter  what — and  so  forfeited  my  opportu- 
nity for  entering  the  Prussian  Army  as  an  of- 
ficer. I  therefore  determined  to  gain  by  my 
wits  what  I  had  lost  by  my  folly.  I  was,  as  you 
who  know  me  can  testify,  an  unusually  tall 
and  fine-looking  young  man.  Now  it  occurred 
to  me  that  if  I  could  once  attract  the  attention 
of  the  king  (he  is  here  referring  to  Frederick 
the  Great)  he  would  undoubtedly  desire  me  as 
a  recruit  for  his  'tall'  regiment,  and  if  I  had 
an  opportunity  to  explain  to  him  my  situation, 
I  might,  after  all,  secure  my  coveted  commis- 
sion. I  therefore  secured  a  situation  as  a  serv- 
ant in  the  king's  own  household,  under  a  ficti- 
tious name,  of  course;  and  I  was  highly  de- 
lighted when  I  found  that  I  had  been  dele- 


210  NEW   BROOMS 

gated  as  one  of  the  waiters  at  table,  for, 
thought  I,  now  is  my  great  opportunity  cer- 
tainly at  hand.  But  alas  for  my  hopes!  The 
king  bestowed  upon  me  no  notice  whatever, 
and  for  all  the  attention  my  height  secured 
from  his  majesty,  I  might  have  been  a  dwarf. 
"So  it  went  on  for  weeks,  and  I  had  nearly 
despaired  of  my  commission  when  I  hit  upon 
the  audacious  scheme  which  solved  the  prob- 
lem. I  determined  to  attract  the  king's  notice 
at  any  cost,  and  when  next  I  waited  upon  him, 
I  deliberately  pretended  to  stumble,  and  with 
an  air  of  awkwardness  I  emptied  down  the 
neck  of  his  majesty  a  plate  of  exceedingly 
hot  soup.  In  a  moment  there  was  an  uproar. 
The  king  was  in  a  fury  of  temper  and  the 
majordomo  was  in  a  fair  way  to  die  of  fright 
and  chagrin,  but  my  purpose  was  accom- 
plished. The  king  had  looked  at  me.  He  ob- 
served my  height  and  my  aristocratic  bearing. 
He  questioned  me,  and  I  told  him  my  whole 
story  frankly,  omitting  nothing  but  the  ruse 
whereby  I  had  brought  myself  to  his  notice. 
I  secured  my  commission  in  his  regiment,  and 


THE    REWARD    OF    MERIT    211 

from  that  time  on  I  advanced  steadily.  The 
king  never  forgot  me,  but  kept  a  friendly  eye 
upon  me.  He  once  said  in  my  presence :  'Gen- 
tlemen, I  never  see  a  plate  of  hot  soup  that 
I  do  not  think  of  my  good  friend  the  Lieuten- 
ant-Colonel Paul  von  Pulitz.' ' 

Now,  Mr.  Idler f  I  have  no  opportunity  for 
spilling  hot  soup  down  the  necks  of  my  clients 
and  my  conscience  will  not  permit  me  to  attract 
their  notice  hy  gross  neglect  of  duty.  My  ef- 
fective work  has  failed  to  bring  upon  me  their 
favorable  regard.  Finding  myself  so  situated, 
and  being,  even  yet,  hopeful  of  some  oppor- 
tunity for  bettering  myself,  I  have  written  you 
this  letter.  I  have  done  so  in  the  hope  that  it 
may  meet  the  eye  of  some  one  of  my  clients, 
perhaps  that  of  the  literary  gentleman  through 
whose  barrel  I  first  made  your  acquaintance 
and  the  acquaintance  of  the  ingenious  Lieuten- 
ant-Colonel Paul  von  Pulitz. 
I,  am,  Sir, 

Your  humble  servant, 
CHARLES  CLINKER. 


THE  BLESSINGS  OF  THE  BLIND 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  Those  who  are  blessed,  as  the 
saying  is,  with  two  eyes  and  the  gift  of  sight, 
are  much  given  to  expressing  sympathy  with, 
and  sorrow  for,  the  blind.  It  would  be  churlish 
to  quarrel  with  so  unselfish  a  sentiment,  for  it 
is,  indeed,  very  good-natured  of  those  who  are 
busily  engaged  in  seeing  the  sights  of  the 
world  to  spare  the  time  and  the  thought  which 
they  give  to  the  sightless.  Yet  I  often  wonder 
if  the  blind  do  not  sometimes  question,  as  I  do, 
if  a  great  deal  of  this  sympathy  is  not  wasted? 

I,  Sir,  am  blind.  Totally  and  irretrievably 
blind.  I  have  been  blind  all  my  life,  having 
been,  as  the  Irish  say,  "dark"  from  my  birth. 
Born  blind,  in  fact.  My  "affliction,"  as  it  is 
called,  being  natural,  I  was  born  with  no  blem- 
ish to  betray  my  infirmity,  and  it  has  so  hap- 
pened upon  several  occasions  that,  being 

212 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   213 

thrown  into  the  company  of  those  who  had  not 
previously  been  warned  of  my  condition,  I 
have  been  compelled  to  make  them  acquainted 
with  it  myself.  This  information  has  invari- 
ably been  the  signal  for  apology  and  sympa- 
thetic pity.  From  which  I  infer  that  men  gen- 
erally feel  that  the  blind  are  to  be  pitied  and 
consoled.  Also  I  have  read  a  great  deal  of  the 
hardship  of  being  blind,  though  I  have  never, 
I  confess,  been  quite  able  to  see  wherein  that 
hardship  lay.  You  are  surprised,  perhaps,  to 
hear  me  say  that  I  have  "read"  of  this,  but  I 
assure  you  there  is  no  reason  to  be  surprised. 
If  you  are  at  all  acquainted  with  the  progress 
of  science,  as  I  suppose  you  are,  you  must  have 
heard  of  raised  type.  Oh,  yes,  I  read  quite  as 
naturally  as  you,  yourself,  though  I  accom- 
plish with  my  fingers  what  you  do  with  your 
eyes. 

The  result  of  my  reading  has  been  that  I 
have  come  seriously  to  question  the  theory  that 
sight  is  necessary  to  human  happiness  and  effi- 
ciency. It  has  been  borne  in  upon  me  that  men 
possessed  of  two  good  eyes  are  often  appar- 


214  NEW   BROOMS 

ently  unable  to  make  use  of  them.  I  read  that 
men  often  fall  in  love  with  women  who  seem, 
to  all  others,  extremely  ugly;  and  that  women 
as  often  do  the  same  by  men.  And  not  only 
that,  but  that  they  are  quite  frequently  com- 
pletely deceived  in  the  characters  of  the  per- 
sons whom  they  marry,  women  discovering 
their  husbands  to  be  bullies,  and  men  finding 
their  wives  to  be  viragoes  and  shrews;  and  all 
this  when  the  nuptial  knot  is  tied  hard  and  fast 
and  the  damage  is  beyond  repair. 

If  eyes  are  really  of  as  much  use  as  those  who 
see  seem  to  think  them,  how  is  it  possible  that 
people  should  make  such  mistakes?  Blind  as  I 
am,  such  a  thing  could  never  happen  to  me,  nor 
do  I  think  it  could  befall  any  sightless  person; 
certainly  not  one  who  has  been,  as  I  have,  blind 
from  birth.  I  know  the  voice  of  a  shrew  the 
moment  she  opens  her  mouth,  no  matter  how 
pleasantly  she  may  speak  at  the  moment.  I  can 
point  out  to  you  the  drunkard,  the  hypocrite 
and  the  boor  the  moment  I  have  heard  them 
speak.  In  the  tone  of  his  voice  every  man  car- 
ries his  true  certificate  of  character,  be  it  good 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   215 

or  bad.  An  ill-tempered  man  may  conceal  his 
vice  from  you,  who  look  only  at  his  face  and 
judge  his  speech  by  his  words,  but  he  can  not 
deceive  me,  for  I  know  him  by  his  voice.  I 
have  been  engaged  in  business  for  the  last 
thirty  years  and  I  have  never  once  been  taken 
in  by  a  swindler.  I  have  never  yet  been  mis- 
taken in  the  character  of  a  man  with  whom  I 
dealt.  How  many  seeing  men  can  say  as  much? 
Excepting  the  human  being,  we  know  of  no 
such  active  or  intelligent  creature  as  the  ant — 
the  ant  who  lives  in  total  darkness.  Yet  does 
he  not  build  his  cities  and  fight  his  battles  as 
wisely  as  we  do  our  own?  I  sometimes  wonder 
if  the  possession  of  the  power  of  sight  is  not 
a  hindrance,  rather  than  a  help,  in  labor?  The 
ant,  who  can  not  see  at  all,  goes  straight  to  his 
object.  He  is  never  distracted  by  the  sight  of 
things  along  the  way.  The  fly,  on  the  contrary, 
is  possessed  of  a  great  many  eyes;  his  head,  in 
fact,  is  practically  all  eyes.  Yet  what  is  the  fly 
but  a  parasite,  a  nuisance,  a  very  vagabond  of 
insects  ?  Attracted  hither  and  thither  by  every- 
thing that  meets  his  gaze,  he  lights  first  upon 


216  NEW    BROOMS 

one  object  and  then  upon  another,  without 
rhyme  or  reason  save  his  overweening  curiosity, 
until  he  finally  falls  into  a  trap  and  dies  an 
ignoble  death  in  a  spider's  web,  or  caught  fast 
upon  a  sticky  paper.  The  fly  has  no  social  or- 
ganization, no  family  life,  no  mating  in  any 
proper  sense  of  the  word.  He  pollutes  all  that 
he  touches.  His  entire  life  is  a  life  of  destruc- 
tion, as  opposed  to  the  ant's,  which  is  a  life  of 
construction. 

According  to  the  Grecian  mythology,  the 
largest  race  of  men  the  world  has  ever  known, 
the  Cyclops.,  had  but  a  single  eye,  and  that  in 
the  middle  of  the  forehead.  The  stupidest  of 
all  characters  of  the  Grecian  myths  was  Argus , 
who,  though  he  had  more  eyes  than  all  the  gods 
and  heroes  together,  yet  allowed  Hermes  to 
pipe  him  to  sleep  and  so  cut  off  his  head.  In 
the  tail  of  Hera's  peacock,  his  eyes  were  of  as 
much  use  to  him  as  in  his  own  head.  Eros,  the 
god  of  love,  was  blind;  yet  he  was  of  all  the 
gods  the  most  joyful.  And  in  this,  our  own 
day,  is  not  Justice  blind? 

Is  there,  in  all  this,  no  significance  ?  Is  there 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   217 

no  hint  of  an  understanding  of  the  secret  that, 
as  he  who  would  save  his  soul  must  first  lose 
it,  so  he  who  would  see  must  first  be  blind? 

Men  see,  as  we  say,  with  the  mind  as  well  as 
with  the  eye.  Men  also  see  with  the  spirit.  Saul 
never  could  see  the  truth  and  beauty  of  Chris- 
tianity until  he  was  stricken  blind  upon  the 
road  to  Damascus.  But  while  he  was  blind,  he 
saw,  and  so  became  Paul.  Would  Homer  have 
been  the  giant  of  poets  had  he  had  his  sight?  I 
doubt  it.  Would  Milton  have  attained  his 
heights  of  inspiration,  had  he  retained  his  vi- 
sion? I  can  not  believe  it.  For  the  man  who 
has  physical  sight  looks  upon  the  earth  and  the 
works  of  men ;  but  he  who  has  only  the  spirit- 
ual sight,  lifts  up  his  eyes  to  God  and  His 
angels. 

The  shepherd  lad  who  has  never  traveled  be- 
yond his  native  valley  dreams  a  beautiful 
dream  of  the  world  that  lies  beyond  the  hills 
that  hem  him  in.  But  the  tourist  lives  a  life  of 
constant  disillusion,  for  he  finds  in  distant 
lands,  where  he  had  thought  to  find  the  abid- 
ing-place of  Romance,  the  same  humdrum  life 


218  NEW   BROOMS 

of  the  commonplace  that  he  left  at  home. 

We  who  are  blind,  Mr.  Idler,  are  the  shep- 
herd boys  of  this  life.  Enclosed  in  our  valley 
of  darkness  by  the  everlasting  shadow  of  our 
endless  night,  we  dream  of  the  world  that  lies 
beyond  as  a  place  of  beauty  and  happiness. 
For  us  there  is  no  sad  disillusion.  For  us  there 
is  no  rude  awakening  from  the  delights  of 
fancy.  For  us  the  sky  is  always  fair  and  the 
earth  is  always  sweet.  For  us  the  woods  are 
thronged  with  nymphs  and  the  grasses  with 
the  little  people  of  fairyland.  We  do  not  know 
the  gloom  of  age  or  the  horror  of  decay.  We 
do  not  know  the  sight  of  death. 

Do  not  imagine,  Sir,  that  because  we  can  not 
see,  we  can  not  create  images.  We  can,  we  do. 
We  dream  of  the  earth  as  fair  as  other  men 
may  dream  of  heaven.  Because  we  have  never 
seen  beauty,  to  us  all  things  are  beautiful. 
When  I  walk  in  the  garden,  the  scent  of  the 
rose  rises  to  my  nostrils  with  a  sweetness  which 
is  but  intensified  because  I  can  not  see  the  blos- 
som whence  it  springs.  I  finger  its  fragile  pet- 
als, and  I  rejoice  in  its  beauty  of  form,  for  you 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   219 

must  know  that  one  can  feel  beauty  as  well  as 
see  it.  I  lean  my  head  against  the  friendly  and 
sturdy  oak  and  I  hear  the  beating  of  his  heart. 
For  to  me  all  these  things  live.  What  does  it 
signify  that  they  can  not  see,  or  hear,  or  speak? 
7  can  not  see;  am  I  the  less  a  man  for  that?  I 
learn  that  nowadays  it  is  possible  to  communi- 
cate with  people  who  are  born  not  only  blind, 
but  deaf  and  dumb  as  well.  That  it  is  possible 
to  teach  them  to  read  and  to  speak,  even  as  I 
was  taught  to  read  and  speak.  Is  it  not  possi- 
ble, then,  that  some  day,  if  we  will  only  try, 
we  may  be  able  to  break  through  the  long  si- 
lence that  has  separated  us  from  our  brothers 
and  sisters  of  the  woods  and  fields?  Already, 
we  who  are  blind  can  almost  understand  the 
whispered  syllables  of  the  rustling  leaves  and 
the  waving  grass.  May  not  some  other,  one 
perhaps  more  closely  shut  in  with  God  than  we, 
reach  downward  as  well  as  upward,  and  bring 
about  the  universal  understanding?  I  hope  it 
may  be  so. 

My  wife,  who  had  the  sweetest  voice  of  any 
girl  I  ever  knew,  is  as  fair  to  me  to-day  as 


220  NEW    BROOMS 

upon  the  day  when  I  first  fell  in  love.  Her 
voice,  if  anything,  has  grown  more  pleasant  as 
she  has  grown  older.  She,  too,  is  blind,  and  to- 
gether we  enjoy  a  state  of  happiness  which 
comes  as  near  to  being  perpetual  youth  as  it  is 
possible  for  mortals  to  attain.  How  infinitely 
better  this  seems  to  me,  than  to  be  compelled, 
day  after  day,  to  watch  the  fading  of  that 
flower  of  my  early  love !  To  observe  anxiously 
the  lines  of  care  creeping  into  that  dearly  be- 
loved countenance;  to  see  the  snow  of  many 
winters  slowly  whiten  her  soft  smooth  hair  I 
What  a  kindness  of  the  good  God  is  this,  that 
she  remains  forever  young  to  me,  as  I  do  to 
her,  and  that  our  passion  knows  nothing  of  the 
insidious  poison  of  departing  comeliness! 

Curiously  enough,  our  only  child,  the  dearly 
beloved  son  who  was  the  fruit  of  our  attach- 
ment, has  a  perfect  vision.  And  this,  Mr.  Idler, 
odd  as  it  may  seem  to  you  who  are  accustomed 
to  look  upon  this  matter  from  a  different  point 
of  view,  is  the  one  worry  of  my  life.  Many 
a  night  have  I  lain  awake,  listening  to  the  gen- 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   221 

tie  breathing  of  my  wife  at  my  side,  and  turned 
over  and  over  in  my  mind  the  dangers  which 
he  must  face  because  of  his  condition.  Often 
have  I  prayed  God  that  He  might  watch  over 
him  and  turn  aside  his  eyes  from  the  ugliness, 
the  sin  and  the  temptation,  which  his  mother 
and  I  have  mercifully  been  spared!  It  is  hard, 
in  any  case,  to  have  the  child  grow  up  and  go 
out  into  the  world.  But  it  is  infinitely  more 
hard  to  know  that  he  is  almost  as  though  he 
were  of  another  race  of  beings,  and  that  he 
must  endure  the  sight  of  pain,  of  misery,  of 
squalor,  of  poverty  and  of  age !  That  he  must 
be  subject  to  temptations  for  which  I  can  not 
prepare  him,  having  never  met  with  them 
myself. 

I  once  read  a  story  of  a  man  who  became 
mysteriously  possessed  of  the  power  to  read 
the  thoughts  of  all  those  with  whom  he  came 
in  contact.  At  first  he  was  transported  into  the 
seventh  heaven  of  delight,  reveling  in  the 
sense  of  his  new-found  power.  But  soon  he 
came  to  realize  what  a  curse  had  fallen  upon 


222  NEW   BROOMS 

him.  Turn  where  he  would,  he  found  the  minds 
of  men  filled  with  envy,  malice  and  evil.  The 
fairest  faces  served  to  hide  from  others,  but 
not  from  him,  the  most  ignoble  minds.  Be- 
neath the  frankest  and  most  friendly  manner 
he  often  read  the  secret  hatred  and  jealousy. 
Confronted  upon  all  sides  with  the  evidence  of 
the  wickedness  and  baseness  of  his  fellows,  he 
was  at  last  driven  to  despair,  and  by  one  des- 
perate act  destroyed  both  his  power  and  his  life. 

Mr.  Idler j  were  I  suddenly  to  be  granted  the 
gift  of  sight,  I  think  that  I  should  feel  like 
that.  It  is  hard  enough  to  read  of  some  things. 
I  should  not  care  to  look  upon  them. 

There  have  been  those  who,  hearing  me  speak 
so  of  sight,  have  answered,  "That  is  because 
you  have  never  been  able  to  see.  You  do  not 
know  what  a  blessing  sight  is,  because  you  have 
never  enjoyed  it!"  Sometimes  I  comfort  my- 
self with  the  thought  that  it  is  like  that  with 
our  son.  He  can  see,  but  he  was  born  that  way 
and  he  will  never  know  the  difference.  Gradu- 
ally he  will  grow  used  to  looking  upon  things 
which  I  could  not  endure  to  behold.  God  has 


BLESSINGS    OF    THE    BLIND   223 

chosen  to  give  him  the  harder  part;  may  He 
grant  him  the  strength  to  bear  it! 

I  am,  Sir,  your  sincere  friend, 

NOEL  NIGHTSHADE. 


A  TALE  OF  A  MAD  POET'S  WIFE 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  have  long  been  an  interested 
reader  of  your  interesting  periodical,  though  I 
have  not  hitherto  presumed  to  address  you, 
either  personally  or  in  your  character  as  editor. 
I  have  ever  had  an  aversion  for  that  type  of 
person  who  is  constantly  rushing  into  print  to 
air  personal  troubles  and  casting  upon  the 
shoulders  of  the  public  the  burdens  which 
should  rightly  be  borne  upon  his  own.  I  have 
observed,  however,  that  a  great  many  of  your 
readers  do  not  scruple  to  address  you  in  this 
respect  and  are  quite  in  the  habit  of  writing 
you  for  advice  upon  their  personal  affairs,  and, 
since  you  do  not  appear  to  find  this  burden- 
some, I  have  determined  to  make  known  to  you 
my  own  pitiable  plight,  in  the  hope  that  you, 
or  some  of  your  readers,  may  be  able  to  sug- 
gest some  method  of  relief;  for,  indeed,  I  am 

224 


A   MAD    POET'S    WIFE        225 

deep  in  trouble,  from  which  I  seem  utterly  un- 
able to  extricate  myself  by  my  own  devices. 
Lest  I  weary  you,  I  shall  tell  my  sad  story  in 
the  fewest  possible  words. 

While  yet  a  very  young  woman  I  fell  in  love 
with  a  poet.  In  this  there  was  nothing  espe- 
cially noteworthy,  since,  I  suppose,  all  women 
go  through  this  experience  at  some  time  of  life. 
The  unfortunate  feature  of  my  own  affair  was 
that  it  ended  quite  as  I  wished  it  to  end — in 
my  marriage.  I  soon  learned  that  the  qualities 
which  make  the  poet  so  satisfactory  a  suitor  do 
not  always  appear  in  so  favorable  a  light  when 
he  has  become  a  husband.  I  found  it  very 
sweet  and  charming  during  our  courtship  that 
my  lover  should  be  concerned  with  my  spiritual 
welfare  and  that  his  thoughts  should  never  de- 
scend to  the  common  affairs  of  life.  It  would 
have  seemed  almost  like  sacrilege  to  ask  him 
to  consider  with  me  the  sordid  problems  which 
are  commonly  inflicted  upon  young  men  of 
grosser  clay  when  they  have  proposed  marriage 
to  a  young  woman.  So  certain  was  I  that  any 
mention  of  such  trivialities  would  mortally  of- 


226  NEW   BROOMS 

fend  my  fiance  that  I  would  permit  neither  my 
father  nor  my  brothers  to  question  him  upon 
the  subject  of  his  financial  condition.  For  this 
sentimental  whim  I  very  nearly  paid  with  my 
happiness,  for  I  found  soon  after  we  had  been 
wed  that  these  questions  must  inevitably  be 
considered  sooner  or  later,  and  whereas  it  had 
formerly  been  only  a  question  of  the  expedi- 
ency of  my  marriage,  it  was  now  become  a  mat- 
ter of  vital  importance. 

Fortunately,  I  have  always  been  of  an 
excellent  wheedling  disposition,  so  much 
so  that  my  father  used  to  say  I  could 
coax  a  Scotchman  into  extravagance  or 
a  politician  into  honesty  by  merely  smiling 
upon  him.  I  turned  this  natural  gift  to  ac- 
count in  the  case  of  my  husband  by  inducing 
him  to  constitute  me  his  business  agent.  I  then 
went  about  among  the  editors  selling  his  verse, 
and  in  this  I  was  so  successful  that  he  was  soon 
supplying  no  less  than  a  third  of  the  current 
verse  which  was  printed  in  the  six  or  seven  lead- 
ing monthly  magazines  published  in  this  city. 
No  doubt  you  have  often  heard  poets  express 


A   MAD    POET'S    WIFE        227 

surprise  at  the  amount  of  rather  mediocre  po- 
etry which  finds  its  way  into  the  columns  of 
standard  publications.  You  may  understand 
this  more  readily  when  I  tell  you  that  several 
other  writers  of  magazine  poetry,  learning  of 
our  own  arrangement,  immediately  set  about 
acquiring  handsome  and  attractive  wives,  to 
whom  they  turned  over  their  output,  never  ap- 
pearing at  the  offices  of  the  editors  in  person 
but  always  sending  their  wives  as  their  repre- 
sentatives. 

In  this  way  we  managed  very  well  for  sev- 
eral years,  though  latterly  I  have  encountered 
one  or  two  editors  who  were  apparently  either 
very  near-sighted  or  peculiarly  unsusceptible. 
We  were  doing  very  well,  however,  and  my 
husband  had  acquired  a  wide  reputation,  so 
that  he  was  often  invited  to  lecture  before  as- 
sociations of  one  sort  or  another  and  to  give 
readings  at  entertainments  in  private  dwell- 
ings. This  added  to  our  income,  but  both 
of  us  by  now  being  under  the  necessity  of  al- 
ways appearing  dressed  in  the  very  neatest  and 
most  attractive  fashion,  we  soon  found  that 


228  NEW   BROOMS 

whatever  sum  we  had  left  over  from  current 
living  expenses  went  for  keeping  up  appear- 
ances; so  that  we  were  able  to  live  very  well 
but  were  by  no  means  enabled  to  lay  by  a  com- 
petence for  the  future. 

It  was  at  this  stage  of  our  career,  which  is  to 
say  some  three  years  gone,  when  we  were  doing 
better  than  we  ever  had  before,  that  the  sad 
blow  fell  upon  us  which  has  cast  a  shadow  over 
our  household,  and  which  has  left  me,  at  the 
age  of  forty,  a  widow  in  all  but  name  and  a 
pauper  in  anticipation,  if  not  already  one  in 
fact.  My  husband  had  been  invited  to  speak 
before  a  certain  literary  club  or  society,  and  as 
was  always  his  custom,  had  accepted  without 
hesitation.  Little  did  he  realize,  when  he  care- 
lessly mentioned  this  appointment  to  me,  that 
it  would  be  his  last  public  appearance  for  a 
long  time  to  come — perhaps  forever!  Little 
did  I  know  when  he  left  our  apartment  that 
evening,  looking  so  debonair  and  engaging  in 
his  faultless  evening  attire,  that  I  should  next 
behold  him  a  pitiful  wreck — a  driveling  idiot! 


A   MAD    POET'S    WIFE        229 

Yet,  Mr.  Idler,  this  was,  alas !  what  befell  your 
wretched  correspondent.  He  came  back  to  me 
from  that  reading  a  man  without  understand- 
ing, a  mental  incompetent,  a  man  who,  despite 
his  stalwart  frame  and  glowing  health  of  body, 
exhibited  all  the  symptoms  of  senile  decay !  A 
man  who  could  scarcely  scrawl  his  own  name  in 
legible  fashion,  to  say  nothing  of  inditing  son- 
nets, quatrains  and  ballads. 

And  what,  Mr.  Idler f  do  you  suppose  those 
heartless  wretches  who  composed  that  literary 
society  had  done  to  my  innocent  and  harmless 
husband?  Not  content  with  having  him  read 
his  verses,  they  had  insisted  that  he  explain 
them!  And  he,  poor  weak  man  that  he  was, 
yielded  to  the  unhappy  vanity  which  is  the 
birthright  of  all  poets,  and  had  attempted  to 
comply  with  their  request.  The  result  you  al- 
ready know.  His  mind  was  completely  over- 
turned. He  has  spent  the  time  since  that  dread- 
ful evening  in  dictating  to  an  imaginary  sten- 
ographer a  critical  appreciation  of  each  rhyme 
in  Mother  Goose.  Only  once  has  he  at- 


230  NEW   BROOMS 

tempted  anything  in  the  way  of  original  po- 
etry, which  I  hastened  to  jot  down  in  short- 
hand, and  which  was  so  puerile,  so  empty  of 
all  meaning,  that  I  could  not  forbear  to  weep 
heartbrokenly  as  I  transcribed  my  notes. 

Now,  Mr.  Idler,  what  redress  have  I  against 
those  inhuman  creatures,  those  compassionless 
brutes,  who  brought  my  husband  to  this  pass? 
Can  I  sue  them  in  a  court  of  law?  Or  must  I 
bear  without  compensation  the  dreadful  sor- 
row which  has  befallen  me?  I  beg  of  you,  ad- 
vise me  at  once,  as  I  do  not  know  which  way  to 
turn. 

I  am,  Sir,  distractedly  yours, 

BEDELIA  BARDLET. 

P.  S. — All  is  come  right  after  all,  Mr.  Idler. 
After  writing  you  the  above,  yesterday  morn- 
ing, I  determined  to  make  one  more  desperate 
trial.  I  took  around  to  an  editor  the  one  orig- 
inal poem,  of  which  I  spoke,  which  my  husband 
had  dictated  in  his  madness.  That  editor  has 
just  called  me  on  the  telephone  to  say  that  the 
poem  will  be  printed  in  the  next  number  of  his 


A   MAD    POET'S    WIFE        231 

magazine,  and  that  he  finds  it  by  far  the  best 
that  my  husband  has  ever  submitted.  And  so, 
please  God,  it  may  turn  out  that  his  misfortune 
will  prove  to  be  a  blessing  in  disguise. 


THE  LOCK-STEP 
To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  Thackeray  once  said:  "Every 
one  knows  what  harm  the  bad  may  do,  but  who 
knows  the  mischief  done  by  the  good?"  It  ap- 
pears to  me  that  there  is  a  valuable  suggestion 
in  this  query  which  merits  the  consideration  of 
all  men  who  live  under  a  civilized  government, 
and  especially  the  attention  of  young  men  who 
are  about  to  enter  upon  the  serious  business  of 
life.  Young  people,  being  by  nature  some- 
what lacking  in  logic,  are  prone  to  consider 
everything  that  is  good  per  se  as  a  thing  which 
must  necessarily  be  good  in  its  effect,  and  simi- 
larly to  class  all  thing  which  are  bad  in  them- 
selves as  bad  in  their  effects.  Nothing  could  be 
more  erroneous  than  this  assumption.  There  is 
no  man  who  will  maintain  that  a  beating  is  a 
thing  which  is  good  in  itself;  yet  I  am  old- 
fashioned  enough  to  believe  that  many  a  beat- 

232 


THE    LOCK-STEP  233 

ing  has  been  very  salutary  in  its  effect.  Early 
in  life,  I  fell  into  this  common  error  of  con- 
fusing the  inherent  quality  of  an  act  with  the 
quality  of  its  effect,  and  it  is  in  the  hope  that  I 
may  save  some  worthy  young  man  the  miseries 
resulting  from  such  an  error  that  I  am  writing 
this  letter. 

As  Mr.  James  Coolidge  Carter  points  out  in 
his  book,  Law :  Its  Origin,  Growth  and  Func- 
tion, and  as  Blackstone  and  others  pointed  out 
before  him,  all  law  originates  in  custom.  As  a 
custom  becomes  general — so  general  as  to  be 
termed  the  common  custom  among  a  given 
people — it  is  usually  enacted  as  law.  And  even 
where  such  legislative  sanction  is  wanting,  a 
general  custom  takes  on  the  force  of  law  and 
operates  as  law,  as  is  the  case  with  the  great 
body  of  the  common  law  of  England.  Thus, 
a  custom,  which  in  the  beginning  all  are  free 
to  adopt  or  to  reject  as  they  may  see  fit, 
eventually  acquires  the  force  of  a  rule  to  which 
all  are  obliged  to  conform,  whether  from  strict 
legal  necessity  or  merely  by  force  of  public 
opinion. 


234  NEW   BROOMS 

The  law,  theoretically  at  least  and  actually 
in  most  cases,  is  merely  the  expression  of  a  pub- 
lic sentiment.  It  is  the  constant  tendency  of  all 
uniform  and  generally  prevalent  customs  and 
opinions  to  take  on  the  form  of  law.  The  gen- 
eral disapproval  of  profanity,  for  instance,  re- 
sults in  laws  providing  penalties  for  the  use  of 
profane  language  in  public  places.  Practically 
all  ordinances  may  be  traced  to  the  same  source 
of  public  sentiment.  Not  all  laws,  however, 
represent  the  will  of  the  majority.  Certain  of 
our  laws  are  representative  of  the  general  opin- 
ion of  all  mankind,  others  of  the  sentiments  of 
a  majority  of  mankind,  and  still  others  of  the 
ideas  and  prejudices  of  an  active  minority.  To 
the  extent  that  such  habits,  ideas,  customs, 
opinions  and  prejudices  become  crystallized 
into  law,  the  members  of  a  community  become 
enslaved  to  those  habits,  ideas,  customs,  opin- 
ions and  prejudices;  since  a  departure  from 
them  is  followed  by  penalties  and  punishments. 
And  there  are  some  customs  which,  while  not 
actually  laws,  exert  quite  as  strong  an  influ- 
ence upon  the  average  citizen  as  the  duly  en- 


THE    LOCK-STEP  235 

acted  statutes.  The  fear  of  social  ostracism  is 
often  quite  as  effective  a  check  upon  the  incli- 
nations of  an  individual  as  the  fear  of  legal 
punishment. 

Now,  as  every  man  is  the  slave  of  general 
laws  and  customs,  so,  in  a  lesser  sense,  is  he  the 
slave  of  his  own  personal  habits.  And  oddly 
enough  this  is  more  often  true  of  good  habits 
than  of  bad  ones.  Should  the  town  drunkard 
make  a  sudden  resolution  to  reform,  the  town 
may  laugh,  but  nobody  will  condemn  his  reso- 
lution to  mend  his  ways;  nobody  will  be  scan- 
dalized at  his  change  of  habits.  But  should  the 
leader  of  the  local  prohibitionists  suddenly  re- 
solve to  test  the  joys  of  inebriety,  what  a  pro- 
test would  go  up  on  all  sides!  Even  the  town 
drunkard  would  sneer  and  despise  him  as  a 
man  who  had  fallen  from  his  high  estate. 
Much  as  the  inebriate  may  dislike  the  sincere 
teetotaler,  he  dislikes  the  ex-teetotaler  even 
more.  No,  every  man  is  a  slave  to  his  good 
habits  and  he  can  not  hope  to  change  them 
without  exciting  the  animosity  of  all  who  know 
him. 


236  NEW   BROOMS 

I  recall  reading  not  long  ago  a  story  of  an 
eastern  governor  who  was  caught  in  the  act  of 
smoking  a  cigarette.  Now,  there  was  nothing 
especially  horrifying  about  the  fact  that  he 
smoked  cigarettes  except  for  the  fact  that  he 
was  the  vice-president  of  an  anti-cigarette  so- 
ciety. Under  the  circumstances  this  governor, 
who  is  in  all  probability  a  capable  and  fairly 
honest  executive,  has  endangered,  if  he  has  not 
destroyed,  his  political  future — and  all  for  the 
matter  of  a  cigarette!  While  it  may  seem  an 
injustice  to  him  that  he  be  made  to  suffer  a 
political  eclipse  for  so  slight  a  lapse,  there  is 
hardly  a  smoker  who  will  not  heartily  agree 
with  the  idly  busy  people  who  make  up  the 
anti-cigarette  league,  that  the  governor  de- 
serves all  the  punishment  his  outraged  associ- 
ates may  choose  to  inflict  upon  him.  He  has 
been  a  double  renegade;  for  he  has  betrayed 
his  fellow  smokers  by  publicly  indorsing  the 
aims  of  the  society,  and  he  has  betrayed  his 
fellow  members  of  the  society  by  privately  in- 
dulging in  the  very  habit  which  the  society  con- 
demns. 


THE    LOCK-STEP  237 

And  the  general  public  may  very  justly 
condemn  him  not  because  he  smokes  ciga- 
rettes— but  because  he  has  played  the  hypo- 
crite. This  statesman  is  evidently  one  of 
those  foolish  men  who  believe  that  it  pays  to 
appear  better  than  one  really  is,  and  that  an 
undeserved  reputation  for  abstinence  and  vir- 
tue is  better  than  none.  And  of  all  the  possible 
attitudes  that  he  might  have  assumed  in  this 
connection,  the  one  which  he  did  assume  was 
the  worst,  for  it  was  the  most  hypocritical  and 
insincere.  And  what  monumental  folly!  For 
the  sake  of  a  cigarette  he  has  jeopardized  his 
career — by  such  a  slender  thread  is  the  Damo- 
clean  sword  of  public  opprobrium  suspended! 

But  I  am  digressing.  I  did  not  intend  to 
write  you  a  dissertation  upon  the  follies  of 
politicians,  but  to  set  forth,  in  some  sort,  the 
results  of  my  own  stupidity  in  failing  to  dis- 
cover early  in  life  the  tyranny  of  custom  and 
habit. 

I  am,  as  you  may  possibly  have  conjectured, 
a  member  of  the  legal  profession;  which  pro- 
fession I  have  followed  with  some  degree  of 


238  NEW   BROOMS 

success  for  the  last  thirty  years.  I  think  I  may 
say  without  boasting  that  I  have  attained  an 
enviable  reputation  among  my  colleagues  of 
the  bar  as  an  able  advocate  and  a  man  possessed 
of  a  logical  mind  and  a  rather  extensive  knowl- 
edge of  the  "delightful  fictions  of  the  law."  I 
have  no  complaint  to  make  upon  the  score  of 
my  professional  career.  If  it  has  not  led  me 
to  eminence,  it  has  at  least  preserved  me  from 
want.  My  practise,  while  general  and  not  so 
profitable  as  that  of  some  legal  specialists  of 
my  acquaintance,  is  yet  sufficiently  lucrative  to 
enable  me  to  maintain  a  comfortable  establish- 
ment at  home  and  to  pay  without  pinching  the 
expenses  of  my  son's  collegiate  and  my  daugh- 
ter's "finishing  school"  education.  I  have  a 
comfortable  home,  a  healthy  and  happy  fam- 
ily, a  prosperous  business,  a  large  number  of 
congenial  friends  and  a  hale  and  hearty  con- 
stitution. Doubtless  you  will  say  that  I  am 
blessed  beyond  the  majority  of  mankind. 
Doubtless  I  am,  and  doubtless,  too,  beyond  my 
deserts.  But  for  all  these  blessings,  which  are 
obviously  much  to  be  desired,  there  is,  so  to 


THE    LOCK-STEP  239 

speak,  a  fly  in  the  ointment  of  my  contentment. 
And  that  is  just  this — I  have  too  good  a  repu- 
tation! In  me,  Sir,  you  may  behold  a  man  who 
has  become  an  abject  slave  to  good  Repu- 
tation. Totally  unknown  to  the  great  ma- 
jority of  my  millions  of  fellow  countrymen, 
and  having  but  a  modest  degree  of  celebrity 
among  the  members  of  my  own  profession,  I 
am  yet  compelled  to  be  as  careful  of  my  speech 
and  as  circumspect  in  my  actions  as  if  I  were 
the  Czar  of  all  the  Russias!  I  am  bound  hand, 
foot  and  tongue  by  the  ties  of  a  lifetime ;  I  am 
manacled  at  the  cart-tail  of  Respectability;  I 
am  pilloried  in  the  pillory  of  Dignified  De- 
meanor! If  you  will  bear  with  me  a  bit  longer, 
I  shall  endeavor  to  explain  my  present  sit- 
uation. 

I  was  born  and  reared  in  the  little  Missouri 
town  where  I  now  reside.  I  am  personally  ac- 
quainted with  practically  every  man,  woman 
and  child  in  the  place,  which,  while  not  exactly  a 
village,  is  hardly  large  enough  to  be  called  a 
city  outside  of  the  columns  of  our  local  newspa- 
pers. The  present  county  attorney  is  a  young 


240  NEW   BROOMS 

man  of  thirty  whom  I  trotted  on  my  knee 
and  for  whom  I  made  kites  many  years  ago. 
The  county  judge  and  I  fell  out  many  years 
ago  because  he  insisted  that  we  had  been  play- 
ing marbles  for  "keeps",  while  I  maintained 
that  we  had  been  playing  merely  for  fun.  We 
are  now  the  best  of  friends,  however,  and  there 
is  no  judge  in  the  state  who  passes  heavier  sen- 
tences on  convicted  gamblers  than  he.  The  pas- 
tor of  the  church  which  I  attend  is  a  lad  who 
in  former  years  was  a  member  of  the  Sunday- 
school  class  I  taught  and  which  used  to  em- 
barrass me  with  all  sorts  of  questions  concern- 
ing the  wives  of  Cain  and  Abel  and  the  origin 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Land  of  Nod.  And 
so  it  is ;  I  know  them  all  and  they  all  know  me. 
"Jimmy"  Vance  is  our  family  physician;  he 
is  the  family  physician  for  at  least  a  third  of 
our  population.  He  has  been  helping  the  peo- 
ple of  our  town  to  be  born  and  to  die  for  more 
than  thirty  years — but  he  is  still  "Jimmy". 
Jimmy  and  I  were  born  in  the  same  year.  It 
was  once  a  joke  with  us  to  call  ourselves 
"twins"  on  this  account.  But  Jimmy  and  I  are 


THE    LOCK-STEP  241 

"twins"  no  longer.  Jimmy  is  still  a  smooth- 
faced boy  at  fifty-five,  while  I  am  a  gray- 
bearded  oldster.  You  may  gather  something  of 
my  life  when  I  tell  you  that  though  my  Chris- 
tian names  are  Jeremiah  Samuel  (I  do  not 
give  my  surname  for  reasons  you  will  under- 
stand), I  have  never,  since  my  twenty-first 
year,  been  addressed  either  as  "Jerry"  or 
"Sam".  My  wife  calls  me  "Jeremiah",  as  do 
my  other  relatives,  while  my  business  associates 
and  friends  never  grow  more  familiar  than 
"Jeremiah  S." 

When  I  determined  to  enter  upon  the  study 
and  practise  of  the  law,  my  maternal  uncle, 
who  was  himself  a  practising  attorney,  became 
a  sort  of  supplementary  preceptor  to  me  by 
virtue  of  his  avuncular  relationship.  He  as- 
sisted me  in  my  studies  and  when  the  time 
came  for  me  to  be  admitted  to  the  bar,  he  gave 
me  a  deal  of  what  he  no  doubt  considered  sound 
advice  as  to  my  future  conduct.  "Jeremiah," 
said  he,  "there  is  no  profession  on  earth  which 
is  a  more  serious  business  than  the  law.  Men 
do  not  go  to  law  for  fun.  Nobody  brings  a 


242  NEW   BROOMS 

lawsuit  for  mere  amusement.  When  clients 
come  to  you  they  will  come  because  they  have 
serious  business  on  hand  and  they  want  a  sober 
competent  man  to  attend  to  it  for  them.  It  is 
no  joke  to  them  and  they  don't  want  you  to 
joke  about  it.  Now,  my  advice  to  you — which 
you  may  take  or  leave  as  you  see  fit — is  always 
to  keep  a  straight  face.  No  matter  how  funny 
a  case  may  seem  to  you,  don't  laugh.  Your 
dignity  will  be  more  than  half  your  capital; 
see  that  you  don't  forget  your  dignity." 

Such  was  the  advice  of  my  maternal  uncle. 
And  such  was  the  character  I  assumed  upon 
entering  the  practise  of  the  law.  From  the  day 
I  drew  my  first  real  brief  I  became  the  very 
essence  of  dignity.  I  even  wooed  and  won  my 
wife  in  the  character  of  a  dignified  young  man 
of  serious  mind  and  purpose.  She  has  never 
in  all  these  years  suspected  my  innate  frivolity. 
Should  I  yield  to  my  natural  impulse  and  in- 
dulge in  the  nonsense  and  fun  which  has  ever 
been  so  dear  to  my  heart,  I  am  convinced  that 
she  would  at  once  lose  all  respect  for  me,  if,  in- 
deed, she  did  not  think  me  suddenly  insane.  I 


THE    LOCK-STEP  243 

am  grave.  Under  all  conditions  and  circum- 
stances I  am  as  grave  as  an  undertaker.  I  do 
smile  now  and  then,  but  it  is  generally  the  in- 
dulgent superior  smile  which  I  labored  so  hard 
to  acquire  when  young  and  which  I  can  not  now 
shake  off.  I  have  been  dignified  so  long  that 
my  dignity  has  become  a  part  of  me — not 
really  a  part  of  my  inward  personality — but 
a  part  of  my  outward  appearance;  I  should 
feel  naked  and  ashamed  without  it;  it  would 
seem  like  going  about  half-dressed.  I  am  so 
grave  that  nobody  ever  tells  me  a  funny  story 
excepting  the  kind  that  one  tells  a  minister. 
They  are  afraid  to  be  natural  when  in  my 
presence.  As  Midas  turned  everything  he 
touched  to  gold,  so  I  turn  all  my  friends  to 
bores.  No  sooner  do  I  come  into  my  house  than 
the  whole  family  stops  talking  and  waits  to 
hear  what  I  have  to  say.  Nobody  dares  to  in- 
terrupt me ;  nobody  presumes  to  contradict  me, 
unless  it  be  old  Brownly,  who  is  our  oldest  in- 
habitant and  so  considers  himself  somewhere 
near  my  own  age.  Every  one  is  grave  when 
with  me.  That  is,  every  one  but  Jimmy. 


244  NEW   BROOMS 

Jimmy  has  always  seen  through  my  pose  and 
Jimmy  takes  a  malicious  pleasure  in  pretend- 
ing he  is  young  when  with  me. 

From  the  day  I  entered  upon  the  practise  of 
the  law,  I  modeled  my  conduct  upon  that  of 
my  maternal  uncle  who  was,  as  my  boy  Tom 
says,  "as  cheerful  as  a  crutch."  I  abandoned 
the  bright  colored  scarfs  which  have  always  de- 
lighted my  eye,  and  I  donned  the  sober  black 
bow  tie  which  I  wear  to  this  day.  Striped  and 
checked  clothing  gave  way  to  the  non-com- 
mittal pepper-and-salt  suit  of  indefinite  hue 
which  has  been  my  unvarying  garb  from  that 
day  to  this.  And  I  grew  that  Vandyke  beard, 
to  which,  I  am  convinced,  I  owed  my  early 
reputation  for  learning  and  even  now  owe  a 
good  part  of  the  respect  which  I  command. 
My  beard  is  as  fixed  an  institution  as  our  local 
literary  club.  Fashion  has  at  least  relieved  me 
of  the  necessity  of  wearing  a  top  hat,  or  "plug" 
as  we  call  it  here ;  but  fashion  will  never  relieve 
me  of  my  beard,  for  beards  may  come  and 
beards  may  go,  but  mine  grows  on  forever. 
Should  I  shave  that  beard  it  would  electrify 


THE    LOCK-STEP  245 

the  community.  My  wife  would  regard  me 
with  suspicion,  my  children  with  pity,  my 
friends  with  mirth  and  my  clients  with  horror. 
I  verily  believe  that  old  Brown  the  banker,  who 
is  my  best  client,  would  be  less  shocked  should 
I  tell  him  that  I  had  forgotten  how  to  frame  a 
complaint  or  draw  a  mortgage,  than  if  he 
should  walk  into  my  office  and  find  me  clean- 
shaven. 

And  as  it  is  with  dress,  so  it  is  with  other 
things.  Jimmy  Vance,  although  a  doctor, 
never  affected  that  dignity  which  has  come  to 
be  my  strongest  personal  characteristic. 
Jimmy  never  imitated  anybody's  dignity.  And 
as  a  consequence  Jimmy  is  as  free  as  the  wind. 
If  he  wants  to  smoke,  he  does  it.  If  he  wants 
to  drink,  he  takes  a  drink.  If  he  wants  to  go 
roller-skating,  he  goes.  And  nobody  ever 
thinks  of  objecting  to  anything  he  does. 
Jimmy  has  never  led  any  one  to  expect  any 
particular  sort  of  conduct  from  him.  He  is 
full  of  surprises  and  nobody  likes  him  the  less 
for  it.  I  can  drink  at  my  club — occasionally — 
or  at  a  banquet,  or  at  home ;  but  I  can  not  go 


246  NEW   BROOMS 

into  a  bar  like  Jimmy  and  shake  dice  with  a 
traveling  man.  I  can  smoke,  but  I  could  not 
chew  tobacco.  I  can  read,  but  I  can  not  read 
light  novels — that  is,  not  unless  I  hide  away 
to  do  it.  If  I  were  to  go  into  our  public  library 
and  ask  for  The  Siege  of  the  Seven  Suitors  I 
honestly  think  that  old  Miss  Peters,  our  li- 
brarian, would  faint  dead  away.  Now  it  isn't 
that  I  want  to  do  these  things  which  irks  me, 
so  much  as  the  fact  that  I  want  to  be  able  to 
do  them  if  I  feel  like  it.  I  thank  God  I  have 
escaped  the  gravest  danger  which  lies  in  the 
acquisition  of  too  good  habits — I  have  never 
become  what  so  many  men  of  super-excellent 
reputations  do  become — a  hypocrite.  I  have 
been  a  poser,  a  pretender,  a  rebel — ah,  I  have 
fairly  seethed  with  rebellion  against  the 
tyranny  of  this  fictitious  self  at  times! — but  I 
have  never  broken  my  habits  on  the  sly.  I  have 
lived  up  to  the  straw  man  I  so  foolishly  put  in 
my  place;  I  have  gone  around  and  around  in 
my  lock-step  of  respectability  when  I  felt  that 
I  might  gladly  have  died  for  a  single  year  of 


THE    LOCK-STEP  247 

absolute  personal  freedom;  I  have  made  my 
bed  and  like  Damiens  I  have  lain  chained  to  it 
with  iron  chains  for  years;  and  never  before 
now  have  I  cried  aloud ! 

And  Jimmy!  What  a  life  is  Jimmy's! 
Jimmy  is  as  prosperous  as  I ;  as  respected  as  I ; 
far  happier  than  I ;  and  ah,  how  much  more  is 
Jimmy  loved  than  I ! 

When  the  girls  go  away  to  boarding-school, 
Jimmy  kisses  them  good-by;  when  they  come 
home  again,  Jimmy  kisses  them  hello.  Jimmy 
never  misses  an  opportunity  to  kiss  them,  com- 
ing or  going.  But  who  cares?  Nobody.  "It's 
only  old  Jimmy,"  the  girls  say.  "It's  only  old 
Jimmy,"  echo  their  sweethearts.  "It's  only 
Jimmy's  way!"  giggle  their  mothers — for 
Jimmy  kisses  them,  too ;  Jimmy  is  no  fool.  But 
suppose  I  should  try  it?  Who  would  say,  "It's 
only  old  Jeremiah?" 

Since  there  is  small  danger  that  your  maga- 
zine will  ever  be  read  by  any  one  who  will  rec- 
ognize me  in  this  letter,  I  don't  mind  con- 
fessing that  I  did  try  it  once ;  it  is  the  only  sin 


248  NEW    BROOMS 

of  the  sort  that  I  have  on  my  conscience  after 
twenty-five  years  of  dignity,  domestic  and  for- 
eign. It  was  last  year  that  it  happened.  The 
girl  had  been  visiting  one  of  my  daughter's 
chums  for  the  Christmas  vacation  and  she  was 
one  of  the  guests  at  the  Christmas  party  we 
had  at  our  house.  I  came  into  the  front  hall 
and  found  her  standing  all  alone,  directly  un- 
der the  mistletoe.  I  looked  at  her  standing 
there  so  sweet  and  pretty  and  so  unconscious 
of  the  mistletoe,  and  I  wondered  how  it  would 
feel  to  kiss  some  one  on  the  lips.  I  have  been 
kissed  on  the  forehead  for  years.  Even  my 
children  kiss  me  on  the  forehead.  They  learned 
to  do  that  early,  when  they  explained  that  my 
beard  was  "cratchy".  I  looked  at  the  girl 
again.  I  was  tempted  and  I  fell.  That  is,  I 
tried  to  fall,  but  she  wouldn't  let  me. 

"Why  not?"  I  asked  her.  "You  let  my  boy 
Tom  do  it." 

"Oh,  but  he's  only  a  boy!"  she  said. 

"Well,"  I  insisted,  "you  let  Jimmy  do  it!" 

"Oh,  but  he's  an  old  man!"  she  exclaimed. 

"Yes!"  said  I,  "and  so  am  I  an  old  man!" 


THE    LOCK-STEP  249 

"Oh,  but,"  she  protested,  "you're  not  that 
kind  of  an  old  man!" 

That's  it !  That's  always  been  it,  and  that  al- 
ways will  be  it — I'm  not  that  kind  of  an  old 
man!  J.  S. 


THE  FRUIT  OF  FAME 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Idler. 

DEAR  SIR:  I  have  told  many  strange  and 
distressing  stories  in  my  time;  tales  of  strug- 
gle, of  suffering,  of  sorrow  and  of  bitter  dis- 
appointment; for  I,  Sir,  am  an  author,  and 
the  telling  of  tales  has  long  been  my  vocation. 
But  of  all  the  tales  which  I  have  spun  from 
the  thread  of  my  inner  consciousness,  there  is 
none,  I  believe,  more  strange  or  more  filled 
with  disillusionment  than  the  true  story  which 
I  am  about  to  tell  you  now. 

I  began  writing  at  an  early  age.  Indeed,  I 
was  writing  short  stories  while  yet  in  the  high 
school  and  selling  them  before  I  had  done  with 
college.  The  history  of  my  younger  years 
does  not  differ  greatly  from  that  of  most 
young  authors ;  it  is  the  history  of  an  existence 
which  would  have  been  inexpressibly  sordid 
had  it  not  been  glorified  by  youthful  hope  and 

250 


ambition.  I  married  young  and  was  forced  to 
write  constantly  in  order  to  make  both  ends 
meet.  The  years  went  slipping  by  almost  un- 
noticed until  suddenly  one  day  I  awoke  to  find 
myself  upon  the  verge  of  middle  age  and  real- 
ized that  for  years  I  had  been  postponing  the 
writing  of  my  first  real  book,  meanwhile  fall- 
ing unconsciously  into  the  habit  of  giving  all 
of  my  attention  to  the  market  value  of  what  I 
wrote  and  growing  more  and  more  indifferent 
to  the  question  of  its  literary  merit.  I  had,  in 
fact,  become  a  confirmed  hack-writer. 

The  discovery  shocked  me  into  action.  I  de- 
termined then  and  there  that  I  would  write  a 
novel  worthy  of  my  powers  if  I  had  to  give 
to  that  task  the  time  which  should  be  employed 
in  rest  and  sleep.  I  had  never  taken  many 
holidays;  now  I  took  none  at  all.  Every  odd 
moment  was  employed  on  the  great  task  which 
should  lift  me  out  of  the  rut  and  transform 
me  from  a  mere  fiction  machine  into  a  crea- 
tive artist.  I  shall  not  bore  you  with  the  de- 
tails of  that  work;  how  I  toiled  far  into  the 
night  and  arose  before  daybreak  to  finish  a 


252  NEW    BROOMS 

chapter  or  retouch  a  paragraph;  how  I  strug- 
gled with  my  style  which  had  become  corrupt- 
ed and  florid  from  the  writing  of  sensational 
stories  of  adventure;  how  I  tossed  in  my  bed 
when  I  should  have  been  sleeping,  made  wake- 
ful by  the  excitement  under  which  I  labored. 
Suffice  it  to  say,  through  infinite  pains  and 
toil  I  finally  wrote  the  last  line  of  The  Pin- 
headed  Girl.,  and  sent  it  off  to  Messrs.  Buck- 
ram and  Sons  with  a  high  heart.  It  was  ac- 
cepted. 

The  publishers,  according  to  their  usual  cus- 
tom, offered  me  a  royalty  of  ten  per  cent. ;  for 
you  must  know,  Sir,  that  it  is  only  the  estab- 
lished and  successful  author  who  can  make  his 
own  terms.  We  poor  devils  who  are  appearing 
in  cloth  for  the  first  time  must  be  content  with 
what  is  offered,  for  no  publisher  considers  a 
meritorious  manuscript  a  recommendation  in 
any  way  equal  to  a  well-known  name.  The 
book  of  a  famous  author,  like  a  notorious  brand 
of  soap,  is  supposed  to  sell  itself,  whereas,  in 
the  case  of  an  unknown  scribbler,  a  demand  for 
the  work  must  be  created  by  advertising.  Now 


it  is  an  axiom  with  publishers  that  a  modern 
novel,  unless  it  happen  to  be  a  story  of  extra- 
ordinary vitality,  is  dead  in  six  months.  With 
the  birth  of  the  autumn  list,  the  spring  list 
dies,  which  is  to  say,  when  the  books  which  ap- 
pear in  the  autumn  are  thrown  upon  the  mar- 
ket, the  demand  for  those  which  appeared  in 
the  spring  is  immediately  checked  and  often 
dies  out  altogether.  In  six  months  novels  are 
old;  good  only  for  bargain  sales,  second-hand 
stores  and  circulating  libraries.  It  is  therefore 
necessary  that  a  book  achieve  a  good  sale  in 
the  first  six  months  if  it  is  to  enjoy  such  a  sale 
at  all. 

Realizing  this  and  taking  into  consideration 
the  fact  that  The  Pin-headed  Girl  was  the 
work  of  a  literary  nobody,  my  publishers  set 
industriously  to  work  to  create  a  reputation  for 
me.  I  will  say  for  them  that  they  spared  no 
expense  in  making  my  name  familiar  to  the 
public.  It  was  flaunted  on  every  side,  so  that 
no  man  could  ride  in  the  subway,  pick  up  a 
magazine  or  open  a  theater  program  without 
being  made  acquainted  with  the  fact  that 


254  NEW   BROOMS 

Hackett  A.  Long  was  the  author  of  The  Pin- 
headed  Girl.  No  man  could  read  a  literary 
supplement  or  a  monthly  review  without  learn- 
ing that  I  took  coffee  with  my  breakfast;  had 
a  fondness  for  Russian  hoar-hounds  (never 
having  owned  one)  ;  preferred  reading  opera 
scores  to  hearing  the  singers;  did  most  of  my 
work  between  the  hours  of  three  and  five  in 
the  afternoon;  disliked  Bohemian  restaurants; 
bought  my  cigarettes  by  the  hundred;  wore  a 
wing  collar;  and  many  other  things,  some  of 
which  were  true  and  some  not.  If  you  glanced 
at  any  of  the  illustrated  papers  at  that  time, 
you  must  have  seen  me  riding  in  my  six-cylin- 
der roadster  (loaned  for  the  occasion  by  the 
obliging  publisher),  sitting  upon  the  stoop  of 
my  cottage  by  the  sea,  or  seated,  pen  in  hand, 
at  my  desk  in  the  very  act  of  producing  litera- 
ture. I  assure  you,  Sir,  your  correspondent 
was  no  inconsiderable  figure  in  the  public  eye 
at  that  time. 

This  activity  upon  the  part  of  my  publish- 
ers was  not  without  results.  The  first  person 
to  show  the  effect  of  my  sudden  leap  into  no- 


THE    FRUIT   OF   FAME       255 

toriety  was  my  wife.  She  assured  me  that  as 
a  well-known  author  I  must  pay  some  heed  to 
appearances.  I  must  no  longer  lodge  in  a  third- 
class  apartment-house  without  hall-boys  or 
elevators.  When  my  fellow  celebrities  sought 
me  out  to  offer  me  congratulations  upon  my 
masterpiece,  they  must  find  me  in  a  suitable 
environment.  We  must  have  an  apartment 
fitting  for  an  author  already  notable  and  soon 
to  take  a  well-deserved  place  among  the  fore- 
most writers  of  the  day;  an  apartment  which 
should  be  expensive  without  being  pretentious, 
furnished  in  such  a  fashion  that  any  one  could 
discern  at  a  glance  the  touch  of  the  man  of  taste 
and  refinement,  the  natural  aristocrat,  the  man 
of  temperament;  in  a  word,  the  artist.  Hav- 
ing settled  the  question  of  the  apartment,  she 
next  turned  her  attention  to  my  wardrobe, 
which  was,  I  confess,  sadly  in  need  of  atten- 
tion. I  must  no  longer  go  about  in  ready- 
made  clothing.  I  must  patronize  a  fashion- 
able tailor,  I  must  dress  for  dinner,  I  must 
buy  me  a  soft  hat  with  a  bow  at  the  back.  I 
must  cease  my  writing  of  lurid  short  stories 


256  NEW    BROOMS 

and  hair-raising  serials;  to  do  pot-boilers  for 
cheap  monthlies  and  weeklies  was  beneath  the 
dignity  of  an  author  of  recognized  standing. 
You  may  well  believe  that  this  unaccustomed 
notoriety  was  not  without  its  effect  upon  me, 
but  I  was  not  so  carried  away  by  it  as  was  my 
optimistic  mate.  I  hung  back  a  little;  I  pro- 
tested. 

"It  is  all  very  well,  my  dear,"  said  I,  "to  talk 
so  glibly  of  giving  up  my  short  stories  and  my 
serials,  but  we  must  consider  that  they  have 
been,  and  still  are,  my  chief  if  not  my  only 
source  of  revenue.  They  are  nothing  to  be 
proud  of,  I  admit.  They  are  cheap,  shoddy, 
stupid  and  entirely  unworthy  of  the  pen  that 
wrote  The  Pin-headed  Girl.  But,  my  dear, 
they  pay" 

"That,"  said  my  wife,  "is  a  consideration 
which  had  some  weight  before  the  publication 
of  your  novel,  but  an  author  so  well  known  as 
you  now  are  can  certainly  have  no  need  to  de- 
pend upon  such  puerile  compositions  for  his 
income." 

I  thereupon  called  her  attention  to  the  fact 


THE    FRUIT    OF    FAME       257 

that  my  contract  with  the  publishers  called  for 
a  semi-annual  accounting  and  settlement,  and 
that  under  this  agreement,  no  matter  how 
much  money  might  be  due  me,  I  could  not 
hope  to  collect  any  of  it  until  six  months  after 
the  date  of  publication.  To  which  she  replied, 
truthfully  enough,  that  it  would  be  easy  for 
me  to  obtain  anything  we  might  want  on 
credit.  The  upshot  of  it  was,  Sir,  that  I 
yielded  to  her  persuasion  and  began  to  live  in 
a  manner  which  was  little  short  of  princely  as 
compared  with  our  previous  hand-to-mouth  ex- 
istence. I  stopped  writing  pot-boilers  and  set 
to  work  upon  my  second  novel  which  I  named, 
very  aptly  as  I  then  thought,  Out  of  the 
Woods.  Where  my  first  novel  had  been  three 
years  in  the  making,  my  second  was  finished 
in  five  months,  for  I  now  had  plenty  of  time 
at  my  disposal,  and  I  sent  it  off  confidently 
enough  to  Buckram  and  Sons,  and  with  it,  a 
letter  in  which  I  made  it  clear  that  I  would 
expect  a  larger  share  of  the  profits  upon  my 
second  story  than  I  had  been  content  to  accept 
in  the  case  of  The  Pin-headed  Girl.  For,  as 


258  NEW    BROOMS 

I  pointed  out  to  them,  whereas  the  author  of 
The  Pin-headed  Girl  had  been  an  unknown 
scribbler,  the  author  of  Out  of  the  Woods  was 
a  well-known  novelist  who  possessed  the  name 
which  had  been  wanting  in  the  first  instance. 

You  can,  perhaps,  fancy  my  surprise  and 
consternation  when  I  received  a  letter  from 
Buckram  and  Sons  enclosing  their  statement 
of  the  sales  of  The  Pin-headed  Girl  and  a 
check  for  seventy-two  dollars  and  fifty  cents 
in  full  payment  of  all  royalties  to  date.  In 
spite  of  the  money  expended  in  advertising, 
the  sale  of  the  book  had  not  exceeded  five  hun- 
dred copies.  The  letter  further  stated  that 
Messrs.  Buckram  and  Sons  regretted  to  in- 
form me  that  they  were  returning  the  manu- 
script of  Out  of  the  Woods,  as  they  could  not 
consider  publishing  another  of  my  books  upon 
the  heels  of  such  a  failure  as  The  Pin-headed 
Girl. 

This  sudden  collapse  of  my  castles  in  Spain 
left  me  completely  demoralized,  but  it  had  no 
such  effect  upon  my  wife.  She  was  astonished 
at  the  failure  of  the  book,  but  she  held  firmly 


THE    FRUIT    OF    FAME       259 

to  her  position  that  whatever  the  fate  of  the 
book  might  be,  the  fact  remained  that  I  was 
now  a  celebrated  man.  I  could  not  be  blamed, 
she  argued,  because  the  book  had  proved  a 
failure.  It  was  my  part  of  the  business  to 
write  the  book,  it  was  the  publisher's  part  to 
sell  it.  I  had  performed  my  part,  but  Buck- 
ram and  Sons  had  most  lamentably  failed  to 
perform  theirs.  If  they  could  not  sell  a  book 
which  had  been  so  well  advertised  as  The  Pin- 
headed  Girl,  that  simply  went  to  show  that 
they  had  a  very  poor  selling  organization,  and 
the  very  fact  that  they  had  spent  so  much 
money  in  advertising  a  book  which  afterward 
proved  a  failure,  was  in  itself  a  proof  that  they 
were  no  business  men.  In  short,  the  only  thing 
for  me  to  do  was  to  find  a  new  publisher  for 
Out  of  the  Woods;  preferably  some  energetic 
young  man  who  would  not  only  make  a  suc- 
cess of  the  second  book,  but  who  would  realize 
something  from  the  advertising  expended 
upon  the  first. 

This   unanswerable   argument   encouraged 
me  a  little  and  I  submitted  the  second  book  to 


260  NEW   BROOMS 

Franklin  Format  who,  although  a  young  man 
and  a  new  man  to  the  business,  already  had 
several  "best  sellers"  to  his  credit.  A  few  days 
later  he  sent  for  me  and  when  I  was  seated  in 
his  office,  he  told  me  that  he  had  read  my  man- 
uscript with  interest  and  had  found  it  most 
entertaining,  but  before  making  me  any  offer, 
he  would  like  to  know  if  the  book  had  been 
submitted  to  my  regular  publishers.  His  was 
a  young  house,  he  said,  and  he  could  not  afford 
to  antagonize  so  influential  a  firm  as  Buckram 
and  Sons  by  stealing  away  one  of  its  authors. 
I  replied  that  the  book  had  been  offered  to 
them  but  that  they  had  refused  to  publish  it. 
He  raised  his  eyebrows  at  this  and  asked  the 
reason  for  their  refusal.  In  my  innocence  I 
answered  truthfully  that  Buckram  and  Sons 
did  not  want  my  second  book  because  they  had 
been  unable  to  sell  my  first.  On  hearing  this 
he  remarked  sympathetically  that  it  had  been 
a  very  bad  season  for  novels  and  that  several 
on  his  own  list  had  fallen  quite  flat.  Indeed, 
his  own  losses  had  been  so  great  that  he  had 
been  looking  about  for  some  author  with  a 


THE    FRUIT    OF    FAME       261 

"selling  name"  to  help  him  out  of  his  difficul- 
ties. Under  the  circumstances,  however,  it 
would  be  rank  folly,  not  only  upon  his  part, 
but  upon  mine,  to  issue  another  novel  bearing 
my  name  at  a  time  when  the  memory  of  my 
first  ill-starred  book  was  still  fresh  in  the 
minds  of  the  booksellers;  for  while  the  public 
might  know  nothing  of  the  failure,  the  book- 
sellers would  most  certainly  recall  it  upon  see- 
ing my  name  on  a  wrapper,  and  without  orders 
from  the  booksellers  one  might  as  well  burn  a 
book  in  manuscript  as  to  let  it  die  more  ex- 
pensively in  covers.  The  best  thing  for  me  to 
do  would  be  to  wait  a  year  or  two  until  the 
memory  of  The  Pin-headed  Girl  had  com- 
pletely faded  from  their  minds.  In  two  years' 
time  it  would  certainly  be  as  completely  for- 
gotten as  if  it  had  never  been  written,  and  I 
then  might  venture,  with  some  hope  of  suc- 
cess, upon  another  novel. 

And  there,  Sir,  the  matter  rests.  In  some 
mysterious  way  the  word  has  been  passed 
around  among  the  publishers  that  The  Pin- 
headed  Girl  was  a  disastrous  investment  and 


262  NEW    BROOMS 

not  one  of  them  will  touch  Out  of  the  Woods. 
My  wife  threatens  to  leave  me  if  I  abandon 
novel-writing  and  go  back  to  my  pot-boilers; 
she  says  she  could  not  bear  the  disgrace  of 
acknowledged  failure  and  that  I  must  main- 
tain my  present  position  as  a  celebrated  author 
at  all  hazards.  I  have  applied  to  several  ed- 
itors of  my  acquaintance  for  editorial  positions 
and  they  have  all  replied  that  they  had  noth- 
ing to  offer  me  which  would  be  worth  my  con- 
sideration or  worthy  of  my  talents.  My  first 
novel  has  left  me  with  a  reputation,  a  two- 
years  lease  of  an  expensive  apartment,  a  load 
of  debts,  an  angry  wife,  a  scrap-book  filled 
with  favorable  reviews,  an  unsalable  manu- 
script and  a  prospect  of  bankruptcy. 

This,  Sir,  is  the  true  story  of  a  writer  who 
achieved  his  ambition  of  becoming  a  well- 
known  novelist.  If  any  reader  of  your  jour- 
nal, now  engaged  in  hack-writing  and  enjoy- 
ing comfortable  obscurity,  cherishes  an  ambi- 
tion like  mine,  let  him  be  warned  by  my  ex- 
ample, lest  through  the  blighting  touch  of  the 
publicity  agent  he  be  forced,  as  I  am,  to  choose 


THE    FRUIT    OF    FAME       263 

between  beginning  life  anew  under  an  as- 
sumed name  or  slowly  starving  to  death  in  the 
midst  of  luxury. 

I  am,  sir, 

HACKETT  A.  LONG. 


A     000  040  563     9 


